


Two to Shore

by Lamplighter



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Slow Burn, Slytherin Harry Potter, Voldemort is mostly a background event, extremely slow slow burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-21
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2020-10-25 08:35:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 37
Words: 204,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20721302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lamplighter/pseuds/Lamplighter
Summary: Harry and Draco meet in Madam Malkin’s and instantly take a liking to each other.Just kidding. They don’t, but Harry does get sorted into Slytherin, and they do become extremely good friends.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文-普通话 國語 available: [Two to Shore](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22901176) by [echoedsongever](https://archiveofourown.org/users/echoedsongever/pseuds/echoedsongever)

> I’ve always wanted to read a very particular sort of Slytherin Harry AU that I’ve had difficulty finding, and finally decided to write it myself. It took me a year and a half, and I hadn't originally meant to post it, but well, here we are.
> 
> While efforts have been made, everything remains unBritpicked.
> 
> The story is complete at slightly over 200k words. Chapter release will be staggered at every 2-3 days (or sooner) for final proofreading purposes.

“The problem with you, Malfoy, is that you’ve got a silver spoon shoved up your arse,” Harry said, relaxing back into the recliner. Overhead, a strangely lethargic firework coiled in the air and then exploded with distinct reluctance. Harry could see it quite clearly, all sparkles and no smoke, despite the fact that it was the middle of the day. All around them came the noises of the camp: shouts of revelry, laughing children, loud choruses of spontaneous singing.

Draco frowned at him, then directed a pointed look at the entrance of the lavish Malfoy tent behind them. He said, “I’m sure Weasley would lend you a sleeping bag if you dislike your current accommodation, but then you might have to share.”

Lucius and Narcissa had not brought their best — Draco had insisted this with a tone of derision, as if the notion of bringing their best travelling tent for something as middling as the Quidditch World Cup was laughable — but their second best came with six bedrooms (all of which had ensuites), two living rooms, a sizeable kitchen and pantry, a spa, a study with an enchanted bookshelf that could summon books from the Manor’s library, and most notably a balcony which opened onto, Harry had been informed, the southern New Zealand seaside, so it was really quite enough already.

“What I mean,” Harry went on, ignoring the jab about Ron, who was a perfectly nice boy, “is that I’m hungry, and I think I can smell muffins, and I want one.”

“Who’s stopping you?” Draco asked, eyebrows raised. He was in a recliner of his own, his fingers twined loosely in the pages of a book. The book’s title was in French. Draco had been reading it, lying horizontal on a large sofa in the first living room, when Harry had finally arrived via a late morning Portkey two days ago, and he had barely parted with it since. Knowing him, it was probably a book of foreign curses.

“You said Soddy was preparing breakfast!” Harry exclaimed in exasperation.

“She is.”

“It’s past two.”

“Are you on a schedule? Relax.”

It was Harry’s stomach that was on a schedule, but as they had both heard it growling over the past hour he didn’t feel a need to elaborate on this any further. Instead he said, “I just don’t see why we have to eat fancy food that takes ages to prepare every meal —”

“Calamari is not fancy,” Draco said, turning a page. “Patience, Potter. Soddy would have gone to serve my parents first.”

The Quidditch match between Ireland and Bulgaria had been running for some forty-six hours or so. Apparently, Viktor Krum had caught pixiepox, the wizarding equivalent of a Muggle cold. As the match stretched on both teams had resorted first to regulation doses of Siezefyre’s Stay Up potions, and then inevitably to reserve members. Then the swap had happened again, and then again, so that the current fielded players were mostly all reserves. The rumour was that Bulgaria had called in a team of Healers to monitor Krum’s condition, and were waiting for the right moment to field him again and end the match quickly. The score was 2370 to 1950 to Ireland, as displayed by the enchanted banners that flew over the camp and flashed whenever there was an update. When Ireland’s reserve Chasers and Keeper were on Bulgaria’s score rose quickly, but the gap was still steadily widening.

Harry and Draco had watched the match from their box well into the second night before deciding to take a break. Lucius and Narcissa, on the other hand, had returned to the tent to sleep both nights, but otherwise spent their time in the stadium.

Fifteen minutes after Harry had given up hope on sustenance and had begun woefully contemplating his demise, Soddy popped into being beside them, spreading her makeshift toga-like garment that might’ve once been a tartan picnic blanket, and announced, “Brunch is being ready on the balcony, Master Draco.”

Harry snorted. _Brunch_ at nearly three. But, well: they had woken at noon, and Draco had stayed in his bed until half past one, eating Chocolate Frogs and reading his book, impervious to Harry’s attempts to rouse him.

It was chilly in New Zealand; Harry grabbed Draco’s discarded cloak as they passed through the second living room, wrapping it around himself. Draco tutted at him and cast a Warming Charm over them both.

“Do try to remember that magic is real, Potter,” he drawled in his typical way, pulling out his seat next to the round wooden table.

Harry could hardly forget it, considering the current view from the southern hemisphere. He pulled the borrowed cloak tighter around himself stubbornly, then smiled at the full plates in front of them, and at his glass of pumpkin juice, which was slowly filling up on its own.

The calamari was good. After a few bites Harry abandoned the knife and fork in favour of using his fingers. It was — however beautifully displayed — actually just fish and chips.

They ate mostly in silence, staring at the rolling waves and a distant storm out at sea. Meal times were the only time Draco could be parted from his book; even during their day and a half at the match he had kept it in his robe pocket.

Finishing first, Harry could not help but glance at Draco’s plate, on which the chips were still piled high. Draco nudged the plate toward him slightly without a word.

“Thanks,” Harry said, grinning.

Draco wiped at his mouth with a napkin, pushing his chair back to better gaze at the view. It never seemed to be night time on the balcony, even though there was the issue of timezones. It was always the early morning, or perhaps the late evening: the sun skimmed the horizon, lazy and intimate.

Harry was just finishing off the last chip when Draco cleared his throat and confessed, “Father said.”

There had been a time, during all of first year and through a good chunk of second year, when Harry had learnt to hear that phrase and partially tune out whatever followed. He turned to Draco and waited.

“Father said,” Draco continued with apparent difficulty, “that there was — is — to be a display.”

“A display,” Harry echoed blandly. “Of what?”

“He isn’t the one responsible!” Draco protested, as though they were already arguing. Then he added sullenly, “He said not to tell you.”

Harry strongly doubted that Lucius ‘I have the ear of the Minister’ Malfoy had merely gone along with someone else’s plan — whatever it was — and was not in any way responsible. But saying so would be a waste of time. Instead he asked, “And when will this — display — take place?”

Draco twitched, making a motion that might have been an aborted attempt to look over his shoulder. Harry did it for him. There was no one there. Draco said, his voiced strained, “After the match.”

“Oh,” said Harry. “So whenever Viktor Krum gets over his cold, then?”

“Harry,” Draco said intently, not laughing, “this is serious.”

“Is your dad participating?” Harry asked, and as Draco — frowning irritably — drew in breath to answer, headed him off with, “If it’s serious, you should tell him not to.”

They both knew very well that Lucius was not the sort of person who took direction from his son. Draco shut his mouth and looked away. The stiff line of his shoulder said that he was upset.

“I’m sure it’s,” Harry tried, hearing quite clearly the lack of conviction in his own voice, “not as bad as —”

“Don’t be stupid,” Draco snapped. “You said Pettigrew got away.”

“So did Sirius Black.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“He sent me a birthday card,” Harry said defensively.

Draco looked at him like he was crazy. “So?”

“So it wasn’t all bad news.”

“I never implied the contrary.”

Harry leaned back from the table. “If this is about Buckbeak again —“

“It’s not about that stupid hippogriff.” Draco put the thumb and forefinger of one hand to his temples briefly, closing his eyes. Harry wondered if he knew that he had picked up the gesture from Narcissa. “I meant that — you can’t just go rushing off like you do, Potter. It’s dangerous. If Pettigrew is what he is, then — it’s not good. And that dream you had … Promise me you won’t be a Gryffindor.”

Drinking the last of his pumpkin juice, Harry considered. He said, “I’m staying at the Malfoy tent, aren’t I? That’s safe, considering.”

Draco stared at him suspiciously. After a moment he seemed to realise that Harry was being sincere, unspoken words about Lucius aside, and marginally relaxed. “Right. If anything happens, we’ll come here.”

Just then there came a distant roar from outside the tent, not completely unlike the roar of the ocean before them. They both jumped slightly in alarm, and then glanced at each other. Harry smiled sheepishly.

“Must be Krum,” Draco deduced a beat later, and together they left the balcony and rushed for the stadium.

On the way there they bumped into Hermione Granger. Literally bumped — she was carrying a stack of books, and the collision sent them all tumbling.

“Sorry,” Harry gasped, helping her to her feet. “Sorry, sorry. Are you all right?”

“Harry,” she said, somewhat crossly, then waved her wand, floating the books back into her arms. “No, it’s my fault. I couldn’t see where I was going, and then everyone started rushing around.” She turned and noticed Draco, who had stood off to the side as soon as the books went flying. “Malfoy.”

Draco gave no indication that he had heard her speak.

“You’re, er, getting ready for school?” Harry asked, spotting _Hogwarts: A History_.

“I’m trying to,” Hermione said. “Term starts in four days! There’s so much material I haven’t revised, and this silly game won’t end.” She huffed disapprovingly. “Honestly, it was interesting to begin with, you know, the logistics of large wizarding gatherings, and so on, but I don’t know why it couldn’t finish sensibly at a set time.” Then, eyeing Draco carefully, she leaned in and whispered, “Have you heard from…?”

“Oh,” Harry said, and grinned at her. “Yeah, I have. He’s — he’s doing well, I think. Listen, Hermione, thanks again for your help with the Time Turner. I know we didn’t get much of a chance to —“

“Potter,” interrupted Draco loudly, “are you going to the match, or shall I proceed to our seats alone?”

“Yeah, calm down Malfoy, I’m coming,” Harry told him, then turned back to Hermione, who was now looking at Draco with an odd expression on her face. “What about you? They’re fielding Krum again, and he might catch the Snitch.”

“Oh, well,” Hermione said, shifting the books. “I need to put these away, actually, but maybe I’ll head back after if this is finally going to be over.”

“All right then,” Harry said amicably. “I’ll see you later?”

“Sure,” Hermione replied easily.

“If you could choose a less inconvenient time to woo your girlfriend,” Draco began testily as they went on their way again.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Harry said, shoving at Draco’s shoulder. Draco shoved back twice as hard. “She’s helped me a lot over the years, that’s all, it wouldn’t kill you to be polite to her as well.”

“I’ve helped you too!”

“Uh huh.”

“Don’t forget I practically went into the sewers for you, Potter.”

And then complained about it copiously for weeks after, Harry remembered, but he also remembered Draco’s ashen face when Harry had emerged from fighting the basilisk, and Draco’s terrified grip on his hand when he had been lying in the hospital wing. Harry said, “Yeah, yeah.”

Draco muttered something. Harry caught the words ‘full of herself.’

“Oh yes,” he said teasingly, “full of herself, bossy, thinks she knows best, likes to read, top of the class, snores at night, whines nonstop, has a terrible sweet tooth, sings off-key … who are we talking about again?”

“I don’t,” Draco said in a dangerous voice, “snore at night.”

“Fine,” Harry conceded, noting that none of the rest of it had been denied. “Anyway, you just don’t like her because she has better marks than you in half the classes, and she’s Muggleborn.”

Draco made an unhappy shape with his mouth, but didn’t reply.

That evening, Krum performed a flawless Sesdan Rise and caught the Snitch, ending the match 2510 against 2240 to Ireland. The Veelas and the Leprechauns — whose animosity towards each other had waxed and waned over the course of the match — began posturing threateningly across the pitch again as Bagman announced the final score, and there was considerable commotion in the stadium as efforts were made to quell the impending brawl. Harry and Draco watched from afar using their Omnioculars, laughing and commenting on the play-by-play.

They kept talking about it afterward, sitting up in their beds in Draco’s room in the tent (the Malfoys had supplied Harry with his own room, but Draco’s had an extra bed, and they were used to sleeping in the same dormitory, so it only seemed to make sense). They dissected the entire match exhaustively; Draco, who had been relentlessly enthusiastic about Quidditch right up until the moment when Harry had made the Seeker position for Slytherin’s team and he hadn’t, was rarely so willing to engage on talk about strategy and flight manoeuvres. Usually, he was careful to feign a level of disinterest, always acting as though he were doing Harry a huge favour whenever Harry invited him to a game of one-on-one Catch-the-Snitch.

But Lucius had issued a warning, and tonight Draco was nervous.

Harry saw it and didn’t comment on it. The conversation crept on well into the small hours of the night, the two of them getting sleepier and sleepier. When the screams started, it was almost a relief. Almost.

Draco sat up from where he had fallen onto his pillow. “Stay here,” he hissed at Harry.

Harry sat up as well, pushing his hair back from his face. “_Tempus_,” he cast. It was twenty past three.

Draco was looking at him warily. “Stay here, Potter,” he repeated.

“I’m not moving, am I?” Harry said irritably.

“You’re putting on your shoes,” Draco observed with resignation.

Harry paused in the middle of tying his laces, trying to think of an excuse, and then he heard a voice that sounded like Hermione’s.

Draco had heard it, too. “Shit,” he said.

Harry shot to his feet and was through the door before Draco had finished cursing.

***

They didn’t see each other again until Draco grumpily shoved his way into Harry’s compartment on the Hogwarts Express.

Draco had followed him out of the tent immediately, but in the crush of panicking bodies they had been separated, and then Harry had, miraculously, found Hermione, who had been alone and was missing her wand. And after that there had been that business with the Dark Mark, and Harry hadn’t been able to leave Hermione by herself until she had her wand back, and by then Arthur Weasley had arrived, and Hermione was staying with his family, so Harry had been relieved, until Mr Weasley had shown him a missive from Professor Dumbledore, which advised — commanded — that Harry stay at the Burrow until term began, if he would not return to the Dursleys.

The Weasleys were good people, and Hermione was certainly friendly enough with them, and Harry liked Ron, but they were — too kind to him. Mrs Weasley fluttered around him for a morning and a half, all smiles and welcome, and by the end of the second day he was longingly counting the hours till Platform 9¾. The Burrow was _noisy_, all the time. It was the sound of family, of people who had lived their entire lives together in close quarters and who loved and were comfortable with each other. Harry was an outsider and they treated him accordingly: as though he were delicate china that might explode in a very Slytherin manner all over them unless they handled him carefully. Only Fred and George acted towards him the way they usually did at Hogwarts, with assessing looks and whispers behind his back. Their unchanged behaviour had been deeply reassuring.

In any case, it was with no small sense of homecoming that Harry greeted the sight of Draco sliding the compartment door closed and sitting down.

“Potter,” Draco said icily.

“Draco,” Harry said. “Er. How are you?”

Draco just gave him a look. He took out his book and made a big show of removing the bookmark — which momentarily glowed a bright silver before sliding itself to nestle in some earlier pages — and ostensibly began to read.

“Look,” Harry started to say, but was interrupted by the door opening.

It was Pansy. She smiled sweetly at the two of them and said, “Hey Harry, Draco, mind if I —“

“Leave, Parkinson,” Draco snapped.

“Wow,” said Pansy. “Who hexed a Kneazle up your arse?”

“Sorry, Pans,” Harry said, wincing. “Greg and Vincent are two carriages down with Millie, I think. Try there?”

“_Blaise_ is in there with them,” Pansy replied with an air of supreme martyrdom. But she shrugged and left, adding only, “I’d lock the door if you two want to hog the whole place to yourselves, and Draco, whatever it is, remember that if you want to commit murder you should prepare an alibi beforehand.”

As soon as she was gone Draco had his wand out and trained on the door. “_Colloportus_.”

“Okay,” Harry said, willing to try again. “Draco, look.”

Draco sighed. He looked tired: there were no dark circles under his eyes — Narcissa would have charmed them away — but there was a set to his mouth that made him appear older than he was. He said, “Let’s just leave it. I don’t want to argue.”

Harry waited, but evidently Draco was telling the truth. He sat back and smoothed out the pages of his book, saying nothing further. After a little while he stretched out to rest his feet atop the opposite seat, on Harry’s side, and Harry copied him; their postures mirrored one another’s.

As they drew closer to Hogwarts, it began to rain. The day grew dim very rapidly, and soon condensation had formed so thickly on their side of the glass that it was impossible to see clearly outside. There was only the impression of raindrops, and every so often a distant, flashing light.

When the food trolley arrived Harry bought his usual amount. Draco didn’t look up from his book, but once Harry placed some sandwiches and Chocolate Frogs next to him, he reached for them absently and ate.

“What is that book about?” Harry asked, finally giving in to his curiosity as the train pulled into the station in the wet and the dark.

“Hm?” Draco hummed, looking up and blinking as though waking from sleep.

Harry nodded at the cover. “Your book. What’ve you been reading?”

“Oh, it’s a novel,” Draco said, as Harry stood up and stretched. “Mother recommended it to me.” He unlocked the door and went into the corridor.

Following behind him, Harry asked, raising his voice, “A novel? About?”

“It was written by a witch in the 15th century,” Draco answered obliquely, sounding as though he could go on about irrelevant details for some time, but there were already too many people in the corridor, too many conversations around them at once for their own to continue undisturbed.

The rain was coming down in sheets outside. Just before they disembarked Draco reached back and tapped Harry on the head with his wand, enunciating the spell crisply: “_Impervius_.”

It wasn’t enough to block the downpour completely, but it held out long enough for them to weave through the crowd and run swiftly towards the carriages relatively dry. Harry, who couldn’t see the Thestrals, didn’t even have time to curiously pat at the air as he normally liked to; Draco, who had apparently been in the room when his Great Aunt Walburga Black had passed away, directed at them his usual nod of acknowledgement. (They had puzzled over the mystery of Harry’s inability to see Thestrals last year, when the Dementors had revealed Harry’s memory of his mother’s death. Draco had suggested that maybe it didn’t count because Harry had no real memory of his parents _alive_, and then he had seen the look on Harry’s face and stopped talking.)

They had kept the train compartment to themselves; they could not do so for the carriage. Everyone was rushing for a spot, eager to get to the castle and dry ground. Even as Harry climbed onto his seat, two more people got in hurriedly, laughing at each other.

It was Hermione and Ron.

“Harry! How come you’re so dry?” Ron demanded, shoving his hair out of his face, rubbing at his cheeks.

“We would be too,” Hermione told him, as the carriage began to move, “except you dragged me out too quickly before I could cast _Impervius_. Honestly, Ron.”

Ron shrugged at her, looking so pathetically sodden Hermione laughed again.

Draco, who was sitting opposite Harry, had shifted as far away from Ron as possible.

“Oh, ugh,” said Ron as he noticed. “Malfoy. I thought something stank.”

“Yes, Weasley, it’s the smell of the filth you were born in,” Draco returned venomously.

“Hi, Malfoy,” Hermione said politely.

“Harry, mate,” Ron said, “you know you could have sat with us on the train, instead of running off to go be with this git.”

Eyes flashing, Draco said, “I imagine he was eager to get away from your unwashed self, after being forced to spend —“

Harry reached across and put a hand on Draco’s knee. Draco stopped and glared, affronted.

“Ron,” Harry said lightly, keeping his gaze trained on Draco, “thanks again for having me over. I really appreciated it. But if you start something with Malfoy I may have to punch you in the face. I just want to be clear.” He turned and looked at Ron.

For a moment it seemed like Ron was tempted to test this declaration, but to Harry’s relief he backed down, saying, mildly enough, “All right, Harry. We’re clear.”

Hermione took the chance and began to speak about her desired curriculum for the year. Harry nodded at her to show that he was listening, but he and Draco were once again silent for the rest of the ride.

***

At the feast, the Triwizard Tournament was announced, and Mad-Eye Moody made his grand appearance.

Harry had of course known about the Tournament already through Draco, who had heard it from Lucius. He hadn’t known about Moody, and as the rolling eye flicked its regard across the Slytherin table, he felt a trickling unease run down his spine.

“Relax,” said Draco, voice low and sarcastic. “It’s not like you’ve had a bad track record or anything with the Defence professors, no?”

“I liked Lupin,” Harry told him.

“Yes well,” Draco allowed grudgingly, “he wasn’t completely terrible, even if he was a werewolf.”

On the other side of the table, Pansy whispered, “I heard his eye can see through walls.”

“D’you think it can see through clothes?” asked Blaise, with a wink.

There was a dreadful silence as everyone within earshot contemplated this horrible prospect.

“Don’t think that’s legal,” grunted Greg.

Blaise winked again.

“Stop that,” Pansy commanded.

“Make me,” Blaise said, growing a winsome smile.

While this scintillating conversation continued in front of them, Harry said to Draco, “I heard something about Moody, while I was staying at Ron’s. Something to do with the Improper Use of Magic department at the Ministry.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Draco said. “Father says Mad-Eye’s like a rabid dog.”

The obvious implication was to not get bitten. Harry frowned at his dinner.

“Cheer up, Potter,” Draco said. “Look: treacle tart.”


	2. Chapter 2

Harry’s already dubious estimation of Moody drastically worsened on Thursday, when Moody turned Draco into a ferret.

The first week hadn’t been going too badly, with the exception of the Blast-Ended Skrewts. Draco had dropped Care of Magical Creatures after third year and his altercation with Buckbeak, opting instead to focus on Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, the latter of which he shared with Harry (which was a relief, as Harry did not know how he would otherwise survive a double period of deciphering pictograms).

Once Harry had seen the Skrewts, he almost wished he had dropped Care of Magical Creatures, too. He could have done — Muggle Studies, or something. He would’ve been good at that, wouldn’t he?

He didn’t tell Draco this, because Draco already seemed in danger of imploding from his smugness at being right about Hagrid.

“You’re not right about Hagrid,” Harry told him obstinately. “He’s just — misunderstood.”

“We’ll see about that, once those Skrewts get bigger,” Draco rejoined, smirking his stupid smirk.

Neville Longbottom melted another cauldron in their first Potions class of the year; this distracted Snape’s wrath so effectively for the rest of the period that when it came time to judge Harry’s own attempt, Snape made no disparaging comment. He had in fact made less and less of those since the beginning of third year; sometimes Harry thought it must have pained him to continually put down a student of his own house, but then again the depth of Snape’s hatred was unknowable and possibly bottomless.

“Don’t be melodramatic,” Draco said in response to this, which was absolutely rich coming from him. “Sometimes I think he actually likes you.”

“Shut it, teacher’s pet,” Harry said without rancour, knocking against his shoulder.

When Moody turned Draco into a ferret, it was mostly Harry’s fault.

He had rushed from the class a little too fast, blinking and blinking to try and clear the green of the Killing Curse from the back of his eyelids, and had run straight into Ginny Weasley, bowling her over into some other Gryffindor third-years, who stared at Harry with guarded expressions.

“Ginny,” he said, his mind still caught on the flash and the dying echo of Lily Potter’s voice, reverberating in his head. “Oh, god. Sorry. Here.”

He stretched out a hand, but her friends crowded protectively around her and helped her up in his stead.

“Can you possibly go just one month without crashing into some girl like a brute, Potter?” came Draco’s disdainful drawling commentary from behind them.

Ginny, bless her, looked between the two of them and said, putting her hands on her hips, “Leave him alone, Malfoy.”

“Or what, little weasel?” Draco challenged nastily. As he drew up to them he touched his hand briefly on the back of Harry’s neck.

“Drop it, please, Draco,” Harry said tiredly. Draco had been especially hostile to Ginny ever since she had gone into the Chamber with Tom Riddle’s diary and Harry had followed her down with Draco in tow. As far as Draco was concerned, Harry’s life-and-death encounter with the basilisk was entirely her fault. He’d made that point and stuck to it all throughout their spectacular row that summer about the origin of the diary and Lucius.

“Or I’ll, I’ll hex you!” Ginny said loudly. A couple of her friends nodded at this, and, seemingly taking courage, she added, “You’re not good for him, Malfoy. When he stayed with us he was perfectly fine, and now not a week back with you and he’s all stressed. No wonder, with you constantly griping at him. Why does he put up with you?”

They had gained something of an audience. At the far end of the corridor Harry spied the telltale red of Ron’s head making its way over.

His mother’s voice was still pleading, endlessly. He tried, “Ginny, you don’t know what you’re talking about. Draco, can we just, just go —“

But he was too late: Ron had arrived. He took in the scene with one look and said angrily, “Malfoy, if you’ve been bullying my sister …”

“Shut up Ron, I can take care of myself —“

“I wouldn’t touch your sister with dragonhide gloves if you paid me,” Draco spat. “Not that you can afford to, since your entire family lives in a hovel —“

Ron drew himself up. “Watch it, Malfoy.”

Ginny said, with more viciousness than Harry had thought she could muster, “It’s funny how you go on and on about money when you’re worth less than bat droppings in all the ways that matter.”

Mouth curling, teeth showing, Draco said, “Do you mean to imply that you have some hidden, inner wealth? Please. For one thing, Potter wasn’t ‘perfectly fine’ when he stayed with you, you wretched harlot, he hated it.”

At this last pronouncement Ginny’s face turned a fantastic red, and she plunged her hand into her robes for her wand. So did Ron, after a brief hesitation.

Harry raised his arm, forcing Draco back.

_BANG!_

There were screams, and suddenly Draco wasn’t standing beside him anymore. Instead, there was a perfectly white ferret curled in the folds of Draco’s robes.

“What —“ Harry began, as the ferret gave a squeak and made as if to dive for Harry’s legs.

“OH NO YOU DON’T!”

It was Moody — Harry realised in a quick shocked beat that Moody must have been watching the entire situation unfold from his classroom with that all-seeing eye of his — descending upon them with his wand raised.

“A lesson: don’t pick fights with scum,” Moody said to a stunned Ron and Ginny, and to the silent crowd in the corridor at large. He turned to Harry and growled, “Did you get hit?”

“What?” Harry said again. “No.” He bent down towards the ferret. “Professor —“

“Leave it!” barked Moody, and then without warning trained his wand on the ferret — on Draco — and flicked it, causing Draco to launch into the air and slam back onto the ground.

He only managed to do it once. Harry didn’t think, just charged at Moody and made a grab for Moody’s wand. Moody jerked in his grasp and the eye rolled sickeningly in its socket, and there was a moment where Harry realised that despite the wooden leg, despite Moody’s age, Moody was a grown man and was stronger, and his grip on his wand wasn’t loosening at all, and Moody was pointing it at him —

Moody gave a grunt and dislodged him.

“What is going on here?” said the distinctly recognisable voice of Professor Flitwick.

Harry immediately dropped down to Draco and picked him up, swathing his body in the robes. Awkwardly, with one hand, he took Draco’s shoes and crammed them in his bag on top of his books, then slung Draco’s bag across his shoulder as well. In his arms, Draco appeared to be torn between bristling in rage and shoving his head into the robes as though to disappear from the world.

Flitwick was making high-pitched noises at Moody about assault on students, and professional behaviour in a place of education. He paused midway to shoo the onlookers away, and to turn to Harry and say, “You’d best take him to Professor McGonagall, she’ll set him right. Then go report this incident to Professor Snape.”

“All right, Professor,” Harry said, and, not able to bring himself to look at Ron or Ginny, shoved his way through the leftover dredges of the crowd, some of whom were making obvious attempts to get a good look at Draco, tittering to themselves.

***

“Ow,” moaned Draco piteously from his horizontal position on the softest sofa in the Slytherin common room. “Ow, ow, ow.”

By the time McGonagall had transformed Draco back and he had dressed, and they had made their report to Snape (whose face had brewed thunder in a way Harry had not seen before), and then finally went to the hospital wing for Madam Pomfrey to heal the spectacular purple bruising down Draco’s front and check for internal injuries, it had been late enough for dinner. Harry had deposited Draco in the deserted common room and then ducked into the kitchen alone to grab a few plates of food, pausing only briefly to dip into the Great Hall and tell Pansy in particular that no, it had not been Draco’s fault, Draco had not even managed to get his wand out, and yes, Harry thought that Moody had done it deliberately. Some Slytherins had been there on the scene, but Harry wanted to be certain about which version of the story went out to his housemates. Once Pansy knew, the entire Slytherin table would know before dinner was over.

Now, back in the common room, Harry placed the food carefully on the table by Draco and prodded Draco’s arm, which Draco had flung in a sort of fainting maiden pose across his face. “Get up. You must be hungry.”

Draco got up. “Ow,” he said again, as if for emphasis.

Harry sat down next to him and handed him a plate. “Eat.”

Draco ate. He looked miserable about it. Since Harry knew from his own stints in the hospital wing that Madam Pomfrey was an unerringly excellent Healer, he suspected that what remained bruised was Draco’s ego and not so much his chest.

Hoping to reassure him, Harry said, “I told Pansy.”

Draco winced. He pushed his plate away. Outside the windows the lakewater was black with night.

Harry finished eating as well. He leaned back against the sofa.

Draco remained sitting forward, elbows braced on his knees. He said quietly, “I know you wanted to leave. I didn’t mean to.”

“I know that,” Harry said, surprised at the admission. “I’m not blaming you.” He added, almost by habit, “You can’t help being a prat.”

Draco gave a shadow of his usual smirk, and then abruptly sat back and made to lie down again. Harry tried to get up — the sofa wasn’t long enough — but Draco made a noise of protest and he stilled. This accomplished, Draco laid his head on Harry’s lap. He said again, as if offering an excuse, “Ow.”

Harry bit back a laugh. Not knowing where to put his hands, he placed one across Draco’s shoulder and the other one tentatively on his head, in his hair.

The common room wasn’t entirely empty; there were some second-years sitting together in a corner, and a seventh-year reading a book by candlelight in one of the chairs by the western wall. But none of them were looking in their direction.

Draco’s eyes fluttered closed at the touch. He said slowly, “I don’t know if I should bring it up again, but I thought you might want to talk about it.”

He meant Moody’s lesson, and the Unforgivable Curse.

“It was almost like a Dementor,” Harry admitted.

“You didn’t quite go catatonic, so on the whole I thought it was better,” Draco commented sardonically.

Smiling a small smile, Harry carded his fingers gently through Draco’s soft blond hair, focusing on the movement to make sure he got it right. He confessed, “I wish I had other memories of her.”

“You should write to my cousin,” Draco suggested, and Harry puzzled at the reference until he realised Draco meant Sirius.

Lupin had told him a little of his parents, last year. It hadn’t been enough. But other people’s memories transformed into stories were all Harry had. He said, “Maybe I will.”

Draco’s breathing grew slower; he kept his eyes closed. They spent several more minutes in that dreamlike state as the low fire crackled in the grate and the lake all around them spoke only of shadows, until the common room wall slid open with its familiar grinding of stone on stone and Pansy and the rest of their friends arrived, seething with anger about Draco’s treatment.

***

Harry wrote to Sirius. The first try wasn’t quite right, so he crumpled it and started again. The second attempt was awkward as well, and it too was discarded.

“Potter,” said Draco as he wandered over and picked up one of the balls of parchment on the floor, “perhaps you should consider not littering evidence of your collusion with a wanted criminal across our shared living space.”

They were the only ones in the dormitory. If Draco was so worried, he could get rid of the so-called evidence himself. Harry gave him a look to tell him so, and went back to his seventh attempt.

The problem was that he was not sure on how he should talk with a godfather he hadn’t known he had had until very recently, especially when the godfather in question was the only Gryffindor in an entirely Slytherin family. Harry thought that maybe it meant they were sort of mirrored opposites, and could therefore relate to each other, but then he remembered the twist of Sirius’ face when they had spoken of Harry’s Sorting, and could not then think that being different in that way was a good thing.

But Sirius had sent him a birthday card and a letter, inquiring after Harry’s wellbeing in a stilted sort of way, as if Sirius were forcing himself to talk about the weather when he really wanted to talk about something else.

_There was a huge storm on the night of the Welcoming Feast_, Harry wrote, and then, before he could stop himself, _Please tell me about my parents_.

What had they been like?

Had they liked him?

Was it a good thing, that he had his mother’s eyes, his father’s face?

Over his shoulder, Draco peered at what he had written and announced, “Okay, this one’s fine. You’re sending it.”

“What?” Harry exclaimed. “No!”

“Yes,” Draco insisted, and snatched the parchment away, folding it up as he turned around and walked to the dormitory door. Little piles of ash dotted the floor: the remains of his previous letters, lost to _Incendio_.

“I can’t send him _that_,” Harry said, following on Draco’s heels.

“Yes you can.”

“He probably hates me!” Harry hissed urgently as they passed by a group of second-years doing homework together in the common room. “I can’t just ask him personal questions without any lead-up.”

“Don’t be tedious, Potter,” Draco said calmly, striding with inevitability towards the Owlery. “He’s my cousin. Of course he doesn’t hate you.”

Harry spluttered. “That doesn’t even make any sense.”

“The two of you are family,” Draco went on nonsensically.

“He’s my godfather, yes, but we don’t know anything about each other.” And Sirius had talked about _leaving_ his family, that night he had appeared to Harry in desperation and asked for Harry’s help with Pettigrew. If he could do that, he had certainly hated them.

Draco’s nose flared, as if Harry had got it wrong, but he only reached over and whacked Harry lightly over the head with the disaster of a letter, snapping it back instantly as soon as Harry grabbed for it.

“Trust me,” Draco said, and that was that.

***

The Beauxbatons and Durmstrang students arrived as the days grew colder, and Viktor Krum, actual Viktor Krum, sat across from them during dinner.

Harry heard Greg mumble to Vincent, “D’you think he’ll sign my Beater’s bat?”

“Bet he gets all sorts of people asking,” Vincent replied in an undertone. “Bet he’s right sick of it all.”

Greg said uncertainly, “He does look sort of … grumpy.”

Draco leaned across the table and said, in that terribly posh, homeschooled manner of his, “Hello. How do you do? I’m Malfoy. Draco Malfoy.”

He was beaming at Krum, all teeth and shining grey eyes. Krum said, “Hi.”

“And this is my friend, Harry Potter,” Draco continued, putting a hand on Harry’s shoulder. He motioned down the table and introduced everyone within range.

“Hi,” Harry said.

“Hi,” said Krum again.

There was a pause.

“I am liking your ceiling,” said the boy sitting next to Krum, nodding up at the stars. “I am called Stefan.”

“It’s certainly quite impressive, is it not?” Draco said, making a gesture that seemed to imply he was personally responsible for the clear night sky. “May I ask what Durmstrang is like? I suppose you’re used to much harsher winters.”

“Vell,” said Stefan, and soon they were having a lively discussion on the merits of smaller — Draco used the term ‘economically spaced’ — castle floorplans and the Durmstrang curriculum. Krum said little compared to his cohorts, but he did inject bits and pieces of information into the conversation as he ate his way through three plates of the main course.

The part of the table that was not enamoured with the presence of an international Quidditch star was contemplating a Beauxbatons girl sitting at the Ravenclaw table. Blaise had already winked at her twice and failed to garner any sort of reaction whatsoever.

Harry looked at her and then took a bite of some fancy French dish, the name of which he had forgotten but he had had before when staying with the Malfoys. Then he swallowed and looked again.

On his other side, Pansy elbowed him. Scowling, she said, “Seems like blondie over there has Veela blood.”

“What?” Draco asked, interrupting his own explanation of the Forbidden Forest. “Who?”

“_Her_,” Pansy said, jabbing her chin in the general direction.

Draco craned his head. “Oh.”

“‘_Oh_‘?” Blaise repeated incredulously.

“She does have a Veela’s complexion,” Draco acknowledged, and went right on talking about the Forest’s Acromantula nest.

Draco hadn’t been awfully affected by the Veela at the World Cup, either, Harry recalled. The two of them had laughed together at the sight of Ron launching himself off his seat, at the bewildering landscape of both people they knew and complete strangers making a mockery of themselves. At one point Draco had even jokingly made eyes at Harry, pretending preposterously to be a Veela himself, as if his pointy face even came close to the Veela bone structure.

“Like what you see?” Draco asked him, and Harry realised with a start that Krum’s friend Stefan was now chatting fervently with Blaise, and it had been some time since he had begun staring rudely at the Veela girl, lost in his thoughts.

“Yeah,” he answered dryly. “She has great hair, I’ve noticed. Very Veela.”

Draco looked confused for a brief second, but then he snorted. He reached over past Pansy and lifted a fairly large plate of little round pastries stacked together in a cone — it was sparkling in a way that was purely magical — which had just appeared as dessert was served. Daphne’s cry of protest as it was removed from her immediate vicinity was ignored.

“Here, Potter,” he said, putting the tower of sugar right in front of Harry. “Try some of this croquembouche. I think you’ll like it.”

Harry did.

***

One night they were joking about circumventing the Age Line, and the next Harry’s name was coming out of the Goblet, because the universe always wanted to get the last laugh.

As he trudged miserably back to the Slytherin common room, he was consumed with trepidation about the reaction of his housemates, many of whom had all simultaneously turned their heads toward him when his name was read out with the air of vultures considering their next meal, if vultures could also weirdly exude a sense of pride about their prey.

When his slow plodding footsteps at last turned the final corner, he saw Draco standing against the blank wall, holding his Invisibility Cloak.

“Shush,” was the first thing Draco said, even though Harry hadn’t made a sound. Then, because Harry also wasn’t moving, Draco strode forward and wrapped the Cloak around Harry’s neck, pulling the hood carefully over his head. “Pansy’s playing the room, she’s been telling them how incredibly clever you are, since obviously we can’t allow a Hufflepuff to be champion.”

“Does she know how I did it?” Harry asked flatly.

Draco raised an eyebrow. “She’s heavily implying that she does.”

Harry sighed.

“Keep quiet,” Draco instructed unnecessarily, and then spoke the password: “_Clarus_.”

The common room was exceptionally full, and Pansy was indeed doing what she did best. You could see it if you paid perfect attention; she talked to four people and they turned to talk to twelve more, and so on until that particular ripple reached the shore. Harry caught snatches as he stuck behind Draco and they wound their way through:

“That’ll show Dumbledore —“

“— if he’d found a way to do it I would’ve liked to know —“

“— who the hell even cares about Diggory, anyway —“

“Don’t speak as if that old fart matters —“

“— Sacred Twenty-Eight, even though —“

“— just jealous, is all —“

“But think of the opportunity —“

“— cares, remember when he _gave the House Cup to Gryffindor_ because he —“

And:

“There’s Malfoy. Hey, Malfoy!”

The speaker was a sixth-year named Yvonne Rosier. Draco stopped and nodded at her. “Rosier.”

“Where’s Potter?” Rosier asked without preamble.

“I imagine he’s in the briefing room with the other champions, where we all saw him go,” Draco drawled, lifting an eyebrow. Without looking as though he were doing it, he shoved Harry behind him against the wall.

“Oh please, Malfoy, let’s not,” Rosier said, smiling with her rose-petal lips. “I saw you leave earlier. Everyone knows the two of you are joined at the hip.” Harry nearly snorted. Given their current positions, Rosier was more correct than she knew. “Where is he?”

“Clearly not here, Rosier.” Draco sneered back at her. “Really, let’s not.”

Rosier stared at him, still smiling, and then seemed to understand that he was not about to let forth any further information. She said equably, “When you see him again, tell him congratulations.”

“Certainly,” Draco promised, and with a toss of her dark hair she let him go.

Thankfully, their dormitory was empty save for Theo, who was lying on his bed and mumbling to himself. Theo had a habit of doing that, but it wasn’t like he was otherwise shy. If given the chance, he could speak enthusiastically about any number of topics. He just seemed to prefer talking to himself. Harry would have thought him a bit swottish, except that unlike Draco and Hermione, Theo’s marks were average: he seemed to spend all his energy pursuing his own personal studies on subjects Hogwarts didn’t offer.

“Hey, Nott,” Draco said. “Do you mind giving me the room for, oh, let’s say fifteen minutes.”

Blaise would have asked if Draco wanted to have a private wank. Theo just blinked, sat up, and said, “I need to ask Millicent something anyway.”

Once he’d left, Draco walked over to Harry’s four-poster bed and sat down. Harry sat down next to him.

With only the indentation on the bed sheets to guide him, Draco patted at the air until he found Harry’s head. He pushed the hood of the Cloak back, smoothing away Harry’s matted fringe from his forehead.

“What are you doing?” Harry asked.

“Has your scar hurt again?”

“No, not since summer.”

“Well, it doesn’t look any different,” Draco said, and kept smoothing away Harry’s hair. Quietly, he added, “Really, Potter, it seems like every year something is out to kill you. It’s getting a bit ridiculous. Can’t you confine yourself to getting mauled by a hippogriff like a regular student?”

It was mostly Voldemort trying to kill him, Harry didn’t say. He said instead, “How are we going to explain my sudden appearance in the dormitory? And it wasn’t Buckbeak’s fault you have no manners, Malfoy.”

Draco made a scoffing noise. “The same way we explain how you crossed the Age Line.”

“Which is?”

“With mystery.”

“Right.”

“Also,” Draco said with hauteur, “my manners are splendid, thank you very much.” He took his hands away from Harry’s hair and flung himself back across the bed. “Did you know, I saw your girlfriend’s new project the other day.”

“My who? What?”

“And,” Draco went on, his face growing more serious, “I don’t think you needed the Cloak tonight. We’re Slytherins.”

_You’ll make your real friends_, the Sorting Hat had sung.

Harry gave a helpless shrug.

“I know,” Draco said, disarmingly gentle.

And he probably did. He had brought the Cloak in the first place, after all.

***

Hermione Granger, who was not Harry’s girlfriend, had apparently been recruiting people for her new initiative against what she called house-elf enslavement. Harry was of the opinion she needed to hire someone who was better at brand management immediately, because while well-meaning, she had essentially been handing out badges about vomit, and then asking people to pay for them. (He hadn’t bought one; Hermione had not approached him with her pitch even though they had spoken numerous times over the weeks, and in retrospect this was probably due to Draco. Harry didn’t know how, exactly, but it was a pretty safe guess.)

Two weeks after the Goblet spat out Harry’s name, Draco woke Harry up by dumping a bag of his own badges on Harry’s chest.

The badges were larger in size than Hermione’s and said ‘Potter, the One True Champion’ in a silver font on a deep metallic green. Occasionally, a shimmering snake would wind its way across the letters unbidden. Harry had watched Draco’s manufacturing of the badges with a sort of detached amusement initially, but as the days wore on and Draco had devoted more and more late nights to making sure that his so-called vision was fully realised, the amusement had changed into confusion, and finally became terror.

Within a day almost everyone in Slytherin was wearing one. Harry considered arranging his funeral to save Draco the trouble, because he was going to die of mortification before the First Task could have its go at him.

“It’s dragons,” Draco had told him, as soon as the owl from Lucius came back. “It’ll be guarding something you have to retrieve.”

“Great,” said Harry tonelessly.

Since Quidditch matches were outrageously cancelled for the year in order to allow some idiots chosen by a sentient cup to be possibly disemboweled by giant lizards, Harry’s only avenue of stress relief was one-on-one games with Draco. After the revelation that it was dragons, they’d gotten into the habit of getting up early at least three days of the week to fly.

It was during one of these sessions that Harry had an idea. He shared it with Draco.

Draco waited until they were back on the ground. Then he announced, “You’re crazy.”

“It might work,” Harry said.

“Dragons have wings, you know,” Draco informed him condescendingly.

“Yes, well,” Harry conceded, then buckled down: “It’s the only plan I’ve got.”

“I’m still working on it!” Draco said, sounding harrassed.

“What, the badges?”

“Yes, those too.” Draco kicked off from the ground again. Harry followed.

“I don’t see what else I can do —“

“You could distract it. Or blind it, maybe. Or put it to sleep.” But even Draco sounded doubtful; they were only in their fourth year, and dragonhide was famously tough.

They flew a lap around the pitch.

“I think it might work,” Harry said again.

So they practised Summoning Charms. Without his mother to charm them away, the shadows beneath Draco’s eyes grew darker and darker. Harry caught the light from Draco’s _Lumos_ sometimes in the dead of the night: he would turn over and wake briefly, then pull back the curtains of his bed to see that pale, eerie glow, evidence that Draco was reading, searching with futility for a spell that would make Harry safe as the days ticked and tocked.

Disconcertingly, Moody seemed to be fixated on them. In lessons at least this was excusable, but Harry could have sworn that they were being tailed during the rest of the day, too. He was sure of it when one day they exited an empty classroom late in the evening and had not gone ten paces before finding Moody around the corner, apparently patrolling the corridors.

“Potter,” Moody said, the eye spinning. “Malfoy.”

“Professor,” Harry replied, clipped. He put his shoulder in front of Draco’s.

“Constant vigilance, Potter,” said Moody assessingly. “Never know what’s going to happen.”

“No, sir,” Harry said.

Moody’s normal eye stared at him unblinking. “Especially since you’re the youngest Triwizard champion.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You have potential, Potter. More than most of the riff-raff I’ve seen throughout my day. And I like to see potential fulfilled.” Moody clonked his wooden leg on the floor, as though in punctuation. “You ever have any questions about Defence, or the Dark Arts, anything at all, Potter, you come to me. Understood?”

“Right,” Harry said. “Thanks.”

“If I’m not mistaken,” Draco observed once Moody had gone, “he just offered to help you cheat in the tournament.”

“What? No,” Harry scoffed. “More likely he’s under orders from Dumbledore to watch me.”

“One’s cover for the other.”

“I’d have to be an idiot for fall for it,” Harry said disdainfully.

At this Draco’s mouth twitched upward in a smile, but he said nothing more.

A reply from Sirius arrived. It was over ten pages long, and the variances in ink suggested that it had been written in more than one sitting.

There were stories about his parents; not in the way Lupin had spoken of them, which had been as though they were respected peers, to be worshipped as heroes now that they were dead, but in the way Lupin had only hinted at, on the day he had been packing to leave and had haltingly said that Harry sometimes reminded him of Prongs. Sirius talked about Lily and James as though they were any other students to be found wandering in the halls of Hogwarts, people whom Harry could imagine befriending, getting to know. Lupin himself was in the stories, returned from a kind but considerably restrained teacher to awkward boyhood, bumbling and courageous and imperfect.

On some parts of the letter, the ink was already blurred, splotchy. Harry tried to be careful and not do further damage.

Draco, who must have figured out what he was reading, said nothing, though he did make a very rude remark to Blaise one evening when Blaise asked if Harry had been dumped, and by whom.

Just like that, with stifled tears and sleepless nights and desperate days of _Accio_, _Accio_, as if he could Summon good luck, the earth wound round the sun and the First Task dawned.


	3. Chapter 3

Harry thought he had done fairly well, on the whole.

It was only a small burn, and he had every faith in Madam Pomfrey. The important thing was that his Firebolt had not become a literal _fire_bolt. It was a gift from Sirius and he would have been very upset if it had burnt to a crisp.

Draco was very upset Harry had almost burnt to a crisp.

“Potter, sit still, for fuck’s sake,” he said tersely.

“I can do it myself,” Harry argued, then shifted just to be contrary.

Draco did not dignify this with a response. Harry’s hands had been burnt when he had reached for the egg and the Horntail had, with an anguished roar, sent a jet of fire towards her clutch from a distance. Harry had miscalculated: he had not thought dragon’s breath could travel that far, with such force.

It was the third day after the Task, and the visible damage had already been fixed via application of a thick orange paste. But there was still a strange leftover tingle, and Pomfrey had warned that there might be lingering effects on his sense of touch if he did not make sure to use another thinner paste for nerve damage daily for at least a week.

It meant, frustratingly, that he had no use of his hands for one hour every evening before bed as he allowed the paste to settle into his skin. It also meant, apparently, that Draco was never going to shut up ever again.

“‘I have a plan, Draco,’” he was saying now in a mocking falsetto, as he smoothed the paste methodically over Harry’s palms. “‘I think it’ll work.’ Merlin’s tits, Potter, you could have lured it further away.”

Harry had tried logical arguments and careful descriptions of his mental state during the encounter. They didn’t seem to have any effect, in the sense that Draco obviously understood Harry’s point, but still apparently felt the need to continually air his displeasure anyway. So Harry said, “Bite me.”

“Done,” Draco said, meaning the paste, not the biting. “Now don’t —“

“— touch anything, I know,” Harry finished.

From behind his curtains, Blaise snickered.

“I think he did a good job,” said Greg, who had his nose in a Herbology textbook in a way that suggested either bad eyesight or general confusion. “He’s in second place only two points behind Krum. _Krum_, Malfoy. C’mon.”

“Thank you, Greg!” Harry said with alacrity. He turned to Draco triumphantly. “See?”

“Yeah,” Vincent agreed. He appeared to be going through his socks and throwing out the ones with holes. “Good job, Harry. One True Champion, and all that.” Notably, he had placed the badge on top of his pile of robes for tomorrow, ready to be pinned back on.

Draco scowled and put away the jar of paste, knocking over the golden egg sitting on Harry’s bedstand in the process. He gave it a positively murderous look and picked it up, then shoved it unceremoniously into Harry’s underwear drawer.

They hadn’t opened the egg. The Second Task was ages away, and Harry wanted to wait until his hands were fully healed. Also, he sort of thought that if Draco didn’t know what the egg contained, he wouldn’t need to be feverishly researching it.

Draco sat back down on his bed. It was getting late. Harry got up to go back over to his own. As he did so, Draco said, “Fine. Congratulations. On second place.”

It was remarkable how much he made it sound like an insult. But it was the first time he had said it. Harry turned, smiling, and waited for Draco to look up at him so that Draco would see. “Thanks.”

***

Longbottom melted another cauldron in Potions, so devastatingly that that there was nothing of the cauldron left. After melting, it had evaporated, although that had not been observable at first given the luridly purple fumes from the botched potion itself. Harry wasn’t sure if even magic would remove the stench of rotten eggs mixed with lavender from his robes.

As if to punish them all for Longbottom’s failure, Snape held them back after class to tell them in his thickly unhappy drawl about the Yule Ball. Then he added, in an almost uncharacteristically casual manner, that the Triwizard Champions would lead the dance. Harry wasn’t fooled: Snape was looking at him as he spoke, and Harry was definitely not imagining the gleeful glint of malice in Snape’s evil black eyes.

“Gleeful?” Draco said, bemused. “No; you’re imagining it.”

“I’m not,” Harry retorted.

“Who’re you going to take?” Draco asked, and added, at the sight of Harry’s frown, “I did tell you about the ball, you know.”

“When?” Harry demanded.

“When I told you about the the Triwizard Tournament! Why d’you think I asked you if you were okay with Mother buying you dress robes?”

“Oh.”

“Do you ever actually listen to anything I say, Potter?”

“Once in a while,” Harry said. “A lot of nonsense comes out of your mouth, Malfoy.”

Draco shoved him with the side of his arm and asked again, “Who’re you going to take?”

“I don’t know.”

“How about your girlfriend?” Draco suggested.

It was the way he said it, like he just knew Harry was going to get all flustered. Harry looked at him and said, “Huh.”

The next day, he hung back with Hermione after Ancient Runes and asked her. It came out a bit garbled, but Hermione seemed pleased. She smiled at him and he suddenly felt so reassured he had to sit back against a desk.

“Of course I’ll go with you, Harry,” she said.

“Ohthankgod,” Harry said.

“Shall I meet you outside the Slytherin common room on the day?” she asked.

Thinking frantically about propriety and gentleman-like behaviour, Harry said, “Er, no. Um. I’ll come — come pick you up from Gryffindor tower? Is that all right?”

“Of course it is,” Hermione said, still smiling, and she gave him instructions to the Fat Lady’s portrait (which Harry already knew the location of from late night wanderings wearing the Cloak) and arranged a time to meet, like it was an actual date, because it was.

“It was terrifying,” Harry recounted later, as he sat together with Draco, Pansy and Blaise at a round table near the common room fire, working on antidotes for Potions.

“Terrifying?” Blaise echoed. “Harry, you could have anyone you like.”

Pansy sniffed. “He couldn’t have Delacour, that one’s strutting around like she’s made of solid gold.”

“Even so,” Blaise acknowledged. “Everyone but the Veela, then. We all saw you go against the Horntail.” He raised his eyebrows and gave a suggestive smirk, as if to imply that Harry had been very sexy while getting his hands burnt.

“Well,” Pansy said, and giggled. “Okay.”

Draco looked at her curiously. “Would you go with Potter?”

“Sure,” she replied without pause, reaching over to pat Harry’s shoulder when he choked a little, then continued to Draco, “Although: I wouldn’t now, since I’m going with you.” She giggled again.

This was news to Harry. He shot a glance at Draco. Draco gave a half-shrug, then smirked at Pansy.

“My my,” Blaise said. “I’d better get a move on.”

Pansy inquired, “Who are you going to ask?”

“Padma Patil,” Blaise answered with confidence.

“Oh,” Pansy said, in a quiet voice.

“What?” Blaise peered at her face. “Oh, that’s right. You used to be friends with her, didn’t you?”

Pansy turned away.

In an obvious attempt to change the subject, Blaise remarked offhandedly, “Granger is Muggleborn, though, isn’t she?” He scribbled a note on his parchment.

“Oh yes,” Pansy said, scrunching up her nose, making a visible effort to recover from whatever it was that had made her look, for just a moment, as though she were on the verge of crying. “You wouldn’t know it, the way she seems to have swallowed all the textbooks.”

“That’s why,” Blaise said, gesturing with his eagle-feather quill. “She’s overcompensating.”

“She could be less insufferable about it,” said Pansy.

Draco finished writing to the bottom of his current sheet with a flourish, and said, “Parkinson, you have no idea.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Pansy asked. “Don’t tell me _you’re_ friends with a Mudblood, Draco.”

“As if I would be,” Draco said, making a face.

“Don’t call her that,” Harry said sharply at the same time.

“Oh, Harry.” Pansy leaned her chin on one hand and looked at him fondly. “I suppose you would say that. Do you actually like Muggles?”

“Hermione’s a witch. Don’t call her that.”

“Okay, fine,” Pansy acceded without heat. “Muggleborn witch, then. It doesn’t change anything. She’s still a know-it-all Gryffindor.”

Harry frowned at her. “What do you mean, do I like Muggles?”

“Didn’t you grow up with them, or something?”

“He did,” Draco said shortly. “Who has the reference book on ashwinder eggs?”

“Here,” Blaise replied, passing it over. He added to Harry, “What were your Muggles like?”

“They’re not _my_ Muggles,” Harry said in a tone of disgust. If the Dursleys were Harry’s anything, they were a screaming nightmare in his cupboard-sized childhood.

“See,” Pansy observed with satisfaction, “you don’t even like them.”

“No, look,” Harry said intently, putting down his quill. “Not all Muggles are bad. They’re just like you or me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Blaise. “We’re not alike at all. They don’t have magic.”

“I mean in the sense that they can be good people, or bad people.”

“That’s pretty obvious.” Blaise cast a drying spell on his ink. “So?”

“So they should be treated like people,” Harry told him.

“Who’s not treating them like people?” Pansy wanted to know.

Harry thought back to the World Cup, and the display that had been made there. He opened his mouth —

“Death Eaters,” Draco said. He didn’t look up from his writing.

“Death Eaters,” Pansy repeated, as if the words tasted strange. “All right, but _I’m_ not treating Muggles badly. To begin with, I can’t ever recall properly meeting one.”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t —“ Harry began hotly, then stopped and really considered his words. “Maybe you shouldn’t call Hermione what you called her, if you don’t really know what it means.”

“I —“ Pansy said, and then like him seemed to take some time to think. She gave a little sigh. “I think you have a bleeding heart, Harry.”

Picking up his quill again, Harry told her: “I don’t think I do at all. I think we’ve just lead different lives.”

“Evidently,” Draco agreed dryly. “But despite that you’re both on a stunningly similar level when it comes to Potions, which is to say that you’re both pathetic. You’ve written about five monosyllabic words since you sat down, Potter, and Pans, darling, drawing a picture of a unicorn in gold ink does not count as research.”

***

The end of term came, and Harry still did not open the egg. Draco was staying for Christmas — as were most students years four and above, due to the ball — and he thought that they deserved to relax. Draco asked him about it more than once, looking worried, but he, like Harry, seemed to be begging for a break. Either that, or he was distracted by Pansy, who had demanded to see the dress robes Narcissa had bought for Draco so that she could be sure their colours coordinated, or something. She’d then laughed for several minutes when she’d discovered that Harry’s robes matched Draco’s in the style of cut, since Narcissa had shopped for them both. Harry had been bemused; the robes just looked like robes to him, though fancier than his school ones.

In any case, whatever secret was in the egg, he decided it could wait.

They spent the days leading up to the ball alternating between the fire indoors and the snow outdoors, bundled up in Warming Charms. Harry, Pansy, Millie, Greg and Blaise spent two hours one sunny afternoon on a giant snowman — Pansy had very specific instructions: first it was too small, and then it was too bulky, and then it was not handsome enough — only for it to be ruined by Draco and Vincent, who came shooting down the nearest slope to plow right through it on a makeshift toboggan. After that, the only choice was war. To nobody’s surprise Draco was a horrible cheat even in snowball fights.

Harry was trying, also, to write a reply to Sirius. He worked on it mostly when the others were asleep; Draco especially seemed to be sleeping a lot more now, waking up late and dozing after lunch, catching up on all the hours he had lost in the weeks before.

It wasn’t that Harry was adverse to being open with Sirius — Sirius had been honest with him, and deserved honesty back. It was just that Harry did not know what to _say_. What was there that was of note about him, apart from the dead parents and the hours spend huddled in the dark under the stairs?

In the end, he wrote about coming to Hogwarts, about his days in its halls and the idle goings-on of his friends. That seemed better: Sirius had told him stories set in Hogwarts’ past. Harry could tell him about the present.

Christmas Day arrived with the gift of unclouded winter sunlight; even filtered through the ice and water of the lake it was bright and cheerful, winking across Harry’s face as he woke up and pulled aside his curtains.

With the exception of Draco, everyone was already up. They were laughing and opening presents, throwing wrapping paper at each other. Someone, likely Blaise’s mother, had sent Blaise a large bouquet of enchanted flowers that emitted a pleasant melody, and Theo had switched into lecture mode and was speaking at great length about musical botany.

Harry dressed and waited for Draco, who finally woke up at half past ten when the dormitory had already emptied. He rolled half out of bed and squinted hazily at the shimmering green outside the windows, one of which Harry had opened. A fish swam up to the barrier of water and air, mouthing at the surface ponderously.

“Morning,” Harry said to him. “Merry Christmas.”

“Nghfph,” Draco responded, and rolled back into bed.

“Oh no.” Harry went over to pull down the sheets. Draco curled into a ball in response. “C’mon, get up.”

“Why,” came the plaintive question.

“Because,” Harry said, “er, presents?”

“Presents,” Draco echoed sleepily. “I’ll open them later.”

“It’s ten thirty,” Harry told him ominously. “There is no later.”

Draco sat up. “It’s ten thirty?!” He swung his legs off the bed and began to dig in the chaos of the room for his robes, which he had folded neatly over a chair the night before but which had somehow been dislodged in the morning unwrapping. “Why didn’t you wake me up earlier, Potter? _Accio Draco Malfoy’s robes_.”

He got dressed extremely fast, and once he had brushed his hair and washed his face he looked almost normal. The slight puffiness to his cheeks gave it away, however.

“Ten thirty-niiiine,” Harry teased, and dodged preemptively as Draco picked up one of Vincent’s discarded socks to throw at him.

They continued in this fashion to the Great Hall, where breakfast was slowly vanishing as the last stragglers snagged a final piece of toast and reluctantly got up from the tables. The vast majority of the seats were already unoccupied; most people must have been outside already, enjoying the sunshine in the fresh snow that had fallen overnight.

Overhead, four owls hovered against the backdrop of the blue sky. As soon as Draco sat down they flew over to him, looking distinctly annoyed, insofar as avian lifeforms were capable of communicating Malfoyish displeasure. As soon as Draco had untied the package they carried, they were off again, one of them almost cuffing him in the face with its wing.

Draco checked the package for damage, and then, nodding, pushed it over for Harry to open.

“We had something like this once on holiday,” Draco explained as Harry carefully peeled away the layers of paper and lifted out the plates. “I liked it so much I asked the house-elves to learn it, but it took a while for them to get it right.”

“What’s it called?” Harry asked, as Draco reached over to arrange the largest plate in the centre, and the three smaller ones around it.

“_Odette on the Water_,” Draco said, “after, you know, the ballet.”

“Ah,” Harry said facetiously. “Of course, the ballet.”

“Swan Lake,” Draco elaborated.

It seemed more like an art piece than an edible dish, but then again, Harry had thought the same about much of the food Draco had introduced him to over the years. The plates were filled perfectly to the brim with a pale cloudy liquid, and something about the way it looked gave the illusion of extreme depth. Once Draco had set the final plate in its place, there was a sound like the ringing of a bell, and up from the central plate rose a graceful shape, layers within layers, folded over each other like the petals of a rose, or perhaps a peony, or, just maybe, an abstraction of a long curved neck nestled amongst wings. It grew until it was about the height of his goblet of pumpkin juice, and then began to flush with colour: clean greens, pale pinks, baby blues, sweet reds and purples, until it was almost a blossoming rainbow, except the colours were in the wrong order.

“Think of it like ice cream,” Draco instructed once the performance finished. He handed Harry a spoon that had come with the package: the shape of the dip was reminiscent almost of a ladle, but smaller and narrower. “Go on, try it.”

It did have a creamy texture, and was cool in his mouth without making him feel cold. He struggled to describe the taste: “It’s sweet, but salty.”

“Oh Potter,” Draco drawled sarcastically, “you have such a way with words. The dish is about transformation: the taste changes as you progress.”

“What are the other three plates for?” Harry inquired, since they didn’t appear to be doing anything.

“You might find it a bit distracting,” Draco warned, and then took the spoon back from him and tapped it lightly against one of the remaining plates.

The petite figure of a ballerina bloomed upward, her birth mirrored on the opposite side by the figure of a man dressed like a prince. They began to dance, at first slowly on their own plates, but eventually leapt onto the central plate and back as the routine picked up pace. Then the shape of a crescent moon rose from the final plate, which Draco had positioned at the back, and the ballerina became a swan, joining the other birds which had risen from the lake.

“Usually this dish isn’t eaten alone,” Draco explained, as the dance progressed. There was a soft ringing rhythm coming from nowhere at all. “Traditionally it’s served on a large round table, with the decorative plates in the centre so that everyone may view the show.”

“We could’ve done that,” Harry said.

“Yes, but, I thought you were arranging my breakfast for today?” Draco raised his brows. “I’m hungry, Harry. Where is it?”

Harry cast a quick _Tempus_. “Any minute now.”

He ate another bite of the — what had Draco said? — Odette on the Water. Draco really did look hungry, so Harry offered him the spoon. Draco scooped up a small portion and made a noise of appreciation.

As he did so, a Hogwarts plate bearing Harry’s present appeared in front of him.

“Right on time,” Harry observed, pleased.

“What,” Draco said flatly, “is that.”

“It’s a hot dog.”

“Of course it is.” Draco’s mouth twitched. “I mean why. Why did you get me a hot dog.”

“Have you ever had one before?” Harry asked.

“Well,” Draco said, drawing out the syllable. “No.”

“Good. Try it. I got it imported from overseas.” Arranging delivery via International Portkey had been an adventure. Luckily, the hot dog had arrived two days early, and he had been able to give it to the Hogwarts house-elves, who had promised to store it in their pantries which were spelled with stasis to keep food fresh, and had further agreed happily to send it up to the Slytherin table at Harry’s specified time.

“Overseas,” Draco repeated.

“New York,” Harry clarified. There was a little American flag poking up from the sausage, so he thought it was fairly self-evident.

“I’m almost certain you could have procured a hot dog from more local establishments.”

“Authenticity matters,” Harry said stubbornly.

“Have _you_ ever had a hot dog before?” Draco asked in continued bewilderment.

“Er,” Harry said. “Sort of?” He had eaten half a sausage wrapped up in a stale slice of bread once, when the Dursleys had gone on holiday for a week and left him alone with barely anything in the fridge and an allowance of fifty pence. That probably counted, and if it didn’t, well, Hogwarts served sausages as well as bread; it was practically the same thing, except that it didn’t come with stars and spangles.

Draco looked doubtful. Then he affected a shrug, and picked up a knife and fork.

“You’re supposed to eat it with your hands,” Harry told him.

“Unlike you, I’m not a barbarian,” Draco said snottily. “Oh, it’s not completely terrible.”

It was actually probably a gourmet hot dog. It looked fancy enough. There had been a limited number of suppliers willing to Portkey a single hot dog across the Atlantic ocean, and those who were tended to be more of the highbrow sort.

Harry smiled at him. In front of them, the dancing figures came to a twirling stop together and then gradually sank back into nonbeing in each other’s arms, two lovers in a tragedy.

***

“Wow, Hermione,” Harry said with feeling. “You look gorgeous.”

She really did. Her hair was done up smoothly, and most of all she was moving with a sort of gliding elegance. She took his arm and blushed a little at the compliment, saying, “I hope you didn’t wait long.”

She had emerged from the portrait at the exact time she had said she would, down to the minute. “Not at all.”

“Shall we?” she asked, and they made their way down the stairs together.

Harry tried not to trip over his own feet, and thought frantically of something to say. “Er. How’s S.P.E.W.?”

“It’s great!” Hermione replied enthusiastically. “Oh, I’ve been meaning to tell you, I think you know him? There’s a new house-elf working at Hogwarts under pay.”

“Pay?”

“Yep.” They stood waiting for one of the staircases to rotate back. All around them the castle echoed with the sounds of excitement. “Professor Dumbledore agreed to do it. Isn’t that wonderful? His name’s Dobby.”

“What? Did you say Dobby?”

Harry remembered a Dobby: the elf had appeared intermittently to him and Draco the first time he had gone to stay at Malfoy Manor in the summer between first and second year to wail about — something, it was never quite clear. Draco had complained that Dobby was erratic, and that he upset the other elves. After an unforgettable incident involving a cake and a roast chicken, which had made Soddy cry, Harry had suggested that perhaps Dobby ought to be let go, since he was undeniably unhappy. Draco had informed him with resignation that Lucius would not tolerate losing an elf just because the elf was slightly insane, and that house-elves were a part of the house and a member of the family — it was unthinkable to drop them so cavalierly — but, given that Dobby was now here at Hogwarts, Draco must have later convinced his father.

“That’s right,” Hermione was saying. “I’ve been speaking with him, and also — I was thinking about what you said, you know, that S.P.E.W. needed better representation, so I asked Dobby for help, and now we’re knitting socks for liberation!”

Her eyes shown with fervour. Harry resisted the urge to tell her that she had misunderstood his suggestion about branding. “Er. That’s … good to hear?”

“Let me tell you all about it,” Hermione began, and so Harry spent the rest of the slow walk to the Entrance Hall (the corridors seemed suddenly full of students, and it was impossible to move with any kind of speed) being lectured about house-elf rights.

At the Entrance Hall Harry spotted Ron, who was standing with that Gryffindor girl, Brown, and her friend, the other Patil twin.

“Hi Ron,” he called, waving.

Ron scowled thunderously at him and turned deliberately away. Brown looked over her shoulder in their direction and whispered something to him.

“Er,” Harry said, faintly embarrassed. “Is Ron okay? Did Malfoy do something while I wasn’t paying attention?”

“Ugh,” Hermione replied. “Ignore him. He’s been intolerable for ages. First he was going on about how you’re just a Slytherin after glory and then he stopped talking to me once he found out you asked me to the ball and I said yes. And _then_ he made this big display of asking Lavender in the common room, and the two of them have been clinging to each other ever since.”

“Right.”

“It’s like second year all over again,” Hermione muttered, then lifted a hand to her mouth. “I mean, it must be even worse for you, Harry. That’s what I meant. How are you holding up?”

She was gazing at him assessingly. He shifted under the scrutiny. “It’s fine. The Slytherins are — well, it’s like second year, like you said.” Only his House had stood by him, when the rest of the school had wanted his head on a plate. Even Hermione had regarded him with suspicion.

She seemed to know what he was thinking. She smiled with a touch of guilt, and then leaned in, saying seriously in a low voice, “If you need help, Harry, tell me. Okay?”

Harry smiled back. “Okay. Thanks.”

“Potter,” came Draco’s unmistakable drawl.

The fourth-year Slytherins had come up in one big group, Draco and Pansy in the lead. Pansy, like Hermione, looked different. The soft pink of her robes suited her in an unexpected way; the frills contrasted starkly with her neatly cropped black hair, and made her usual smile seem welcoming instead of calculated.

“Granger!” she exclaimed, dragging Draco closer.

“Hi?” Hermione said, sounding confused. As far as Harry knew, the closest the two of them had ever come to acknowledging the existence of the other was through snide passive-aggressive comments while in each other’s general vicinity.

Harry sent Draco a speaking look. Draco gave a barely perceptible shake of his head.

“Tell me,” Pansy gushed, “about your parents.”

“My parents?” Hermione asked, stunned. “Why?”

“They’re Muggles, aren’t they?” Pansy said, as if she genuinely wasn’t sure and needed the confirmation. Once Hermione nodded uncertainly, she went on, “What do they do? How do they get along without magic?”

“Well,” Hermione responded, brow furrowed, “they’re dentists.”

“What’s a dent-ist?”

“Sort of a doctor, I mean a Healer, for your teeth.”

Pansy laughed politely, then stopped abruptly when she realised Hermione wasn’t joking. “Wait. Why do Muggles need Healers for their teeth?”

Hermione took a deep breath, looked surprised at herself for doing it, and plunged into a long explanation about dental hygiene, finishing finally with, “Which is why you should floss daily.”

There was a pregnant silence. Harry coughed.

Pansy started to ask, “But why don’t they just regrow their teeth when —“

“Champions over here, please!” shouted McGonagall’s voice over the chattering crowd. “Champions, to me!”

“That’s us!” Hermione declared unnecessarily. She said to Pansy, “Muggles only get two sets of teeth; they can’t be regrown endlessly. I’ll tell you more about it sometime, if you want.”

“It sounds absolutely riveting,” Pansy drawled, her articulation exactly like Draco’s.

“All right,” Hermione said, still bemused. “Later, then.”

“Later, Granger.”

Harry and Draco shared another look, and then the night began.

***

To Harry’s great consternation, Krum, whom Harry had pegged as being reticent, spent the entire dinner trying to engage Hermione in conversation.

“Herm-own-ninny,” he said, “how has your holiday been?”

“Well, um,” Hermione said, biting her lip and flicking her eyes at Harry, “it’s been … pretty good? I’ve been studying a lot, of course, since OWLs are so close. Oh, I don’t mean to bore you.”

Harry had never seen Hermione apologise for talking about studying in his life before. He gaped, and reached for his glass of water to hide it.

“No, not at all,” Krum reassured her. “Please, tell me. Vhat are you interested in, for the future?”

Krum’s date, a girl whom Harry did not recognise, was beginning to look rather sour.

First Pansy, now Krum. It was Hermione’s question and answer hour. She began to talk about her many and varied considerations: healing, ministry work, teaching, Making A Difference.

It was difficult to get a word in edgewise, until Hermione, seemingly realising that Harry had been rather quiet, turned to him and asked, “And what about you, Harry? What would you like to do, after Hogwarts?”

Harry’s mind blanked. He hadn’t thought about it much; it was more the annual challenge of not being killed that worried him. “I don’t know.”

“Really?” Hermione looked very surprised. “Did the Sorting Hat not put you in Slytherin for ambition?”

Feeling uncomfortable, Harry shrugged.

“Well, what do you like?”

“I like flying,” Harry said, thinking of his morning games with Draco.

“You were very good, with the dragon,” interjected Krum unexpectedly.

Horribly, Harry felt his cheeks warm. Krum might have been trying to steal his date, but it was _Krum_. “Thanks. Um. You were very good, too, I heard. With the dragon, I mean. Not the flying. Although er. I mean, you’re absolutely brilliant at flying. I mean —“

Thankfully, Hermione laughed, interrupting him. She said to Krum, “Harry plays Seeker for Slytherin.”

“Oh?” Krum said with interest. “Your friend, Malfoy, he never said.”

“Quidditch was cancelled this year,” Harry told him sorrowfully.

“Vhat a shame,” Krum commiserated.

“Are you going to continue with Quidditch, after you graduate?” Hermione asked him.

“Vell, I am nearly a year behind,” Krum explained. “Because of the practice, for my team. How do you say, my schedule? It is not normal. But after I am thinking, yes, I vould like to continue.”

Harry was quite happy when everyone had finished eating and the dancing began, until he remembered that he was supposed to lead with the first song.

“Hermione,” he whispered as they got up. “I don’t know how to dance.”

“I don’t know either!” she hissed back at him. “I thought you did!”

“Oh god.” He glanced furtively at the other Champions around them, and copied their poses. “What do we do?”

“Let’s just try and,” Hermione paused, “rotate slowly on the spot? Move in the direction I move in.”

It was easier said than done, but it got better once the dance floor filled with other couples, and Harry felt less self-conscious. He actually was enjoying himself as the song neared its end; Hermione had begun giggling in his arms as they repeatedly botched their attempts at coordination, until it became just like doing any other thing with her, like their travelling back in time together in June: comforting company in unfamiliar territory. So when the next song — much faster — started, and Hermione asked laughingly, “Again?” he agreed.

The dance floor was well and truly full by then. They saw McGonagall dancing with Flitwick (McGonagall actually smiled at them); Delacour dancing with Davies, the Ravenclaw Quidditch Captain; Millie dancing with Theo (now that was a wonder); and Moody dancing with Burbage.

“Working on that egg, Potter?” Moody said, when they got close, but Harry laughed louder with Hermione and pretended he hadn’t heard.

They danced four numbers together and retired, out of breath and still huffing with laughter, to one of the tables. Harry had barely gotten breath back to speak when Krum appeared beside them, asking awkwardly but determinedly if Hermione would do him the honour.

“Viktor,” Hermione said, sounding pleased. “I’d love to, but I need a moment. The next one, maybe?”

“Okay,” Krum said, and with a nod at Harry he left them alone.

Harry huffed. “He seems awfully direct.”

Hermione turned to him. “Harry, are you jealous?”

“I just mean,” Harry clarified, pained, “that it seems impolite.”

“I didn’t think you would be jealous,” Hermione said.

“I’m not jealous!” Harry exclaimed, then, realising the implication, tried to rectify his mistake. “I mean, er — I mean it’s not really my right to tell you who to dance with, um. I don’t mean that. Just, you know.”

“Yes, I see,” Hermione said very gravely, cracking up with laughter again.

“Why did you think I wouldn’t be jealous?” Harry asked suspiciously.

Hermione stopped laughing gradually and spent a long while looking at him, sitting back in her chair, crossing her legs at the ankle.

“I just didn’t think you would be, that’s all,” she said finally, sounding a little sad, a little affectionate, and stretched out her hand, touching her fingers very lightly to his chin. Before he could react, she leaned over and kissed him, just a simple press of lips, to his cheek. “Do you see?”

He didn’t, not at all, but the song was ending and Krum was making his way back to their table.

Once Hermione had been whisked away, Harry sat broodingly by himself, trying to think of what Hermione had been asking him to see. A few girls came up and asked him to dance, but he didn’t know any of them, so he said no. He felt pretty bad about it when the last one teared up, and apologised.

“Don’t say sorry, that just makes it worse!” she cried, and disappeared into the press of bodies before he could take it back.

He was just noticing his own thirst and wondering where the drinks were being served when Draco showed up, a half-full glass of something fizzing in hand.

“Give me some of that,” Harry demanded. Draco handed it over.

“Pansy’s dancing with Zabini,” Draco said as Harry drank in gulps. “You should have seen it: she had a disagreement with Patil.”

Harry gave the glass back. It was almost empty. Draco put it on the table.

“Does Pansy like Blaise, then?” Harry asked.

“No,” Draco said. “I don’t think so. Not in that way.”

“Then why’s she dancing with him?”

Draco had a strange expression on his face. “Why can’t she dance with him?”

“Never mind.”

“Pansy likes Padma,” Draco said, and as Harry turned to look at him sharply, added, “Also not in that way. I mean that she misses her.”

“Oh,” Harry said, suddenly tired. “I did know that.”

“Are you waiting on —“ Draco’s mouth twisted — “your date?”

He was sitting on the table. Harry leaned an elbow next to the empty glass and studied his profile. The dance floor had been well-lit during the first dance, but as the songs progressed the lighting had dimmed, until everything was illuminated only with a muted twilight glow. Draco’s face in it looked changed, more vulnerable.

Harry said, “Hermione’s dancing with Krum.”

“Come with me for a turn in the garden, then?” Draco invited.

A turn in the garden. Harry snorted. “Sure, Malfoy. Lead on.”

***

They passed about a dozen couples in the rose bushes — and at one point even heard Snape yelling at some unfortunates nearby — before they came to a relatively quiet spot by a small conjured fountain. Harry put a hand to the water and splashed his face, gasping at the cold.

Draco, who had been wordless as they walked, said, “Father wrote to me.”

Sitting down on the stone lip of the fountain, Harry asked dutifully, “What did he say?”

Draco kicked at the grass. “Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“Just about how he and Mother were, the affairs of the Manor.”

Harry thought for a moment, then guessed, “He doesn’t do that.”

“He does, but usually there’s a message, and I know what it is.”

“You don’t know it this time.”

Draco crossed his arms and craned his neck to the stars above. “I think he’s worried.”

Lucius Malfoy, worried. Harry guessed again: “My scar hasn’t been hurting. Not since summer.”

“I know, Harry. But.” Draco confessed to the sky, “I’m scared.”

It wasn’t something he had ever admitted, and even though Harry had _seen_ Draco scared before, it was different when he said it. This was an acknowledgement between them of the chasm, of Tom Riddle, of Voldemort.

More than that, it was a secret.

“Did you know,” Draco continued, still talking to the stars, “that when I was little, it was my father who would listen to me when I talked? Mother would too, of course, but she always seemed slightly amused, slightly indulgent. It was Father who took what I said seriously. I remember — when I was really young, and I would go running off on the Manor grounds, and I would find things and bring them to my parents. A rock, a leaf, a discarded bird’s nest. Mother used to transfigure them for me. I loved it. But Father, Father would always ask me: why this rock? Why that leaf? And then he would talk to me about the history of the land, the cycle of the seasons. And I always listened, just like how he always did for me, because I knew that he knew everything.”

Softly, Harry said, “Draco.” And then: “They love you.”

“Of course they love me.”

“No, I meant,” Harry tried, and stopped. “Never mind.”

Draco turned to look at him. “Sometimes I think you’re not scared of anything at all.”

“That’s not true.”

“You flew against a dragon,” Draco recounted. “You fought a basilisk. You fought the Dark Lord when you were _eleven_.”

“I was scared all of those times.”

“Yes, but —“ there was an intense shine to Draco’s eyes — “you’re not, you’re not scared the way I am. You — I don’t know how to explain it to you, Harry. My father knew everything, and now he — he’s worried, and I’m, I don’t …” His lips came together in a pinched line, and he looked away again.

This was one of Draco’s secrets. Secrets, Harry knew, deserved secrets.

“I’ve been scared,” Harry said quietly. “I was scared every time Uncle Vernon threw me into the dark and slammed the door.”

Draco drew in a shaking breath. He had learnt through incessant poking and prodding pieces of Harry’s life with the Dursleys, and had accurately guessed at others, such as the thing with food, and being hungry, and wanting to eat good meals. Harry hadn’t told him about the cupboard; it just didn’t seem to be a topic to be discussed. It was over with. It was done. Wasn’t it?

“I was scared all the time,” Harry forced himself to say. The words came out haltingly, like they didn’t quite fit together correctly. “Not like how you would be scared when you know a basilisk is chasing you. A different sort of scared. It was the worst in the mornings when I woke up and in the nights when I had to sleep.” Behind him, the fountain burbled. “The — the cupboard — it had four thin slits that let in light. When Dudley jumped down the stairs, dust would fall. And there were a lot of spiders, but those were okay. It was — the thing that scared me was that it was, it wasn’t ending. It wasn’t ending, and I — you know, Draco, it didn’t feel like fear. But it was. I was scared. I know that now.”

Draco was staring at him. He said, sounding distressed, “The cupboard?”

“Under the stairs,” Harry said. “It was under the stairs, which was why the dust — anyway. It’s fine now. It really doesn’t matter.”

“Harry,” Draco said, moving over and sitting down.

Harry looked at him carefully, to make sure there was no pity in his expression, but Draco only looked thoughtful, and a little hurt, like what Harry had said had hurt him. So Harry said again, “It’s fine now.” It was, too. Now, no one was shutting a door on him. Hermione had asked him about his future, and he hadn’t known what he wanted to do, but the fact that the question existed for him to ponder was, to the child huddled in the dark, a miracle in and of itself.

“I believe you,” said Draco, which was a relief.

“Anyway,” Harry tried to clarify, “I only meant that I’m like you. I’m on your side. I know what scared feels like.”

There was an extended pause. Harry fixed his gaze on Hogwarts and listened to the distant sounds of celebration. Then, finally, Draco made a soft derisive noise, breaking the moment. “How encouraging, Potter.”

Relaxing, Harry said, “I’m the one who fought the basilisk, Malfoy. I’ll protect you.”

“You’re the one who miscalculated and got overconfident and was nearly fried by a dragon,” Draco reminded him haughtily.

“Nearly is the crucial word there,” Harry pointed out. “Still alive.”

“Yes,” Draco agreed, unfairly serious again. “Still alive.”

They lapsed into silence. Somewhere in the maze of rose bushes, a girl shrieked with laughter.

“By the way,” Draco said as the muffled sound of her mirth faded away, “you’re a terrible dancer.”

Harry rolled his eyes heavenward. “Shut up, Malfoy. I never got lessons, unlike your silver spoon self.”

“Hm.” Draco got up and gestured emphatically for Harry to do the same.

“What?” Harry asked with alarm.

“I’ll lead,” Draco said imperiously, then, when Harry only blinked at him, pulled Harry up by main force.

“What?” Harry said again. “Are we dancing?”

“Do you need me to ask?” Draco said, sounding irritated, and then suddenly he _was_ asking, stepping back and holding out a hand: “May I have the pleasure of a dance, Harry Potter?”

“Er.”

Draco sighed impatiently and grasped Harry’s right hand with his left, placing his own right hand on Harry’s upper back. Harry, thinking back to the position Hermione had taken with him, put his left hand on Draco’s shoulder.

“Not like that,” Draco admonished, and made Harry shift his hand until he was satisfied. “All right: step where I step. If I go backward, you go forward. If I move forward, you go back. I move left foot first, you with your right, like a mirror. You don’t have to anticipate where I’ll move, you just have to pay attention and follow. Can you manage that?”

“You’re a condescending git,” Harry told him. “I’ll try.”

“This is the rhythm,” Draco said, and tapped it against Harry’s back. “Okay? _One_ two three, _one_ two three.”

He began to move around the fountain, bringing Harry with him. After Harry’s literal missteps with Hermione, where he had tried to predict the direction she would go in, this was surprisingly smooth. Draco exuded confidence, and soon Harry found himself falling into the rhythm, even though there was no more tapping after they completed their first lap.

“Can you spin?” Draco asked him, smirking.

“We have been spinning,” Harry replied, meaning that they had been rotating as they moved, but then Draco raised their joined arms and _spun_ him, and once Harry finished stumbling he immediately did it again. And then again. By the third spin, Harry was laughing.

“See,” Draco said, satisfaction across every inch of his face, and Harry was caught off-guard, thinking back to Hermione asking him, _Do you see?_

He stumbled again; Draco righted him.

“Easy, Potter.”

They went around once more, and when they were back in their original position Draco brought them to a gentle stop.

Somewhere, a bug buzzed.

Draco was immediately tense. He let go of Harry’s hand and turned to address a rose bush: “If you dare write about this, Skeeter, it’ll be the last time your words ever see print.”

Harry couldn’t see anyone. “Skeeter? Rita Skeeter?”

“She’s an unregistered Animagus,” Draco explained shortly. “She’s been flitting around Hogwarts since the school year began.”

As a Champion, Harry had given an interview to Skeeter. He recalled that she had had a colourful taste in handbags, but other than that the interview had been unremarkable; it had drawn him unwanted attention for its mere existence once it had been published, but the article itself had seemed, for lack of a better word, rather standard. Krum, Diggory and Delacour had all gotten the same treatment, though Delacour’s photo had understandably been front and centre.

Draco continued, “If I catch you sneaking around us again, my father will make sure you never write another word.”

There was an agitated buzzing, then silence.

“How do we know she’s gone?” Harry asked.

With one last glare at the rose bush, Draco replied, “Doesn’t matter. It’s late. We should head back.”

He was right. It was much darker in the garden than it had been previously; most of the fairies must have grown tired and left, or gone to sleep. A few of them still hovered in the air above the pathway, swaying to and fro.

It wasn’t like anyone would see, especially if Skeeter had truly left. It wasn’t like it would matter even if anyone did. Harry didn’t know why the idea made him so nervous. He did it anyway; as they stepped onto the path he flung his arm around Draco’s shoulders, leaning close to bump their heads together briefly.

Draco just took it in stride. He put his arm around Harry’s waist and applied a faint comforting pressure. He said, warm breath misting, “Happy Yuletide.”


	4. Chapter 4

Rita Skeeter did not write about Harry and Draco dancing in the garden, but a nasty article about Hagrid bearing her name did appear in the Prophet in the new year, as term began.

“Serves him right,” was Draco’s opinion. “He’s half-giant? That explains a lot.”

“He’s a good person!” Harry insisted vehemently.

“So you keep saying, but there’s a difference between being decent and being a decent teacher.”

Furious all the more because Draco was right, Harry dragged him kicking and screaming down to Hagrid’s hut so that they could have a productive conversation, but Hagrid had locked himself inside and refused to open the door.

Despondent, he trudged back to the castle.

Two weeks later, out of the blue, another Skeeter article appeared, this time about Hermione. It was titled _Hogwarts’ Champion Heartbreaker_.

“I didn’t know you were heartbroken,” Draco commented with amusement.

“I thought Skeeter wasn’t going to write about us,” Harry returned irritably.

“She hasn’t. This is only tangentially about you, and doesn’t mention me at all.”

“All this crap she’s insinuating about Hermione isn’t true!”

“So she’s not dating Krum?”

Harry relented. “She’s dating Krum.”

“She didn’t get together with him during the ball?”

“She did.”

“Then what’s false?”

“I’m not heartbroken, for one,” Harry pointed out.

Smirking, Draco read aloud, “‘Harry Potter, a charming young man with a shy smile, was not available for comment, although witnesses claim to have seen him alone and appearing very dejected indeed at—‘“

Harry threw a piece of bread at Draco’s head. Draco blocked it with the paper.

“A shy smile,” Draco repeated, snickering.

“I’ll show you shy,” Harry said threateningly.

“Whatever happened, Skeeter wouldn’t bother with an article like this for no reason.” Draco folded the _Daily Prophet_ up neatly and put it next to his empty breakfast plate. “What did your girlfriend, sorry, Krum’s girlfriend, do?”

“No idea.” Although he had his suspicions, considering Hagrid. “She hasn’t told me.”

“Then let her handle it,” Draco advised. “When are you going to open the egg?”

Harry drank his pumpkin juice.

“Potter.”

“Fine,” Harry said, putting the goblet back down with a _clunk_. “Tonight.”

He regretted his decision and the late hour as soon as the egg starting screaming that night in their dormitory.

“Fuck’s sake,” cried Blaise. “Who’s being _Crucio_‘ed?”

“It’s the egg!” shouted Vincent. “Can you turn it off?!”

“Don’t shut it yet,” Draco yelled. “In case you have to leave it open for a while before there’s a message.”

“What kind of stupid mechanism would that be?” Blaise complained shrilly.

The egg kept screaming.

“Harry,” Vincent shouted, “if you don’t shut it off now I’m going to throw it out the window.”

“That might help, since it’s Mermish,” came Theo’s balanced voice from the doorway.

Harry shut the egg. There was ringing in his ears. “What?”

“It’s Mermish,” Theo repeated, going over to his bed and putting away his robes. “Isn’t it?”

They all looked at each other, then back at Theo. “Er,” Harry said. “Is it?”

“I could be wrong, of course,” Theo said mildly, putting his toiletries back in his trunk and pulling back his bed covers. “But I’ve always been fascinated by elemental linguistics, you know, magical languages that are heavily influenced by environment.” He went over to one of the windows and opened it. “Why don’t you try and see?”

Shooting a bewildered glance at Draco, Harry went obediently over to the window. Gingerly, he thrust his hands holding the egg into the icy lake water, and carefully prised the sides open again.

There was no screaming. Instead there was a haunting tune, muffled by the water. It sounded like someone singing, from a long way away.

“Yep, that’s Mermish,” Theo said.

“I still don’t understand it,” Harry said. “Does that mean I’ll have to learn Mermish to interpret the message?”

“If this message were left by merpeople from a different region, maybe,” Theo said, looking thoughtful. “But otherwise the language is only modified by the element it occurs in, and there’s not much point in making you learn German or something just for the tournament, so it’s likely this will be in recognisable English, as soon as you perceive it within the element.”

“Right. I see,” Harry lied.

“He means you have to stick your head into the water as well,” Draco explained, coming to stand beside him.

“But it’s freezing!” His hands were going numb.

“Best get it over with and take a hot shower directly afterward, then,” Draco said practically and without further ado stuck his head outside.

“Ugh,” Harry said with feeling, and followed.

It was immediately like being in a different world, and he supposed that he technically was. There was the impression of lights to either side — other windows from the Slytherin dormitories and common room — but all ahead of them was a complete darkness that only grew more menacing as the egg sang:

_Too late, it’s gone, it won’t come back._

They stayed with their heads in the water for as long as they could, going back briefly to breathe, until they had heard everything twice. Then Draco went straight to his desk and scribbled out the lines, showing them to Harry for confirmation as Harry wiped the egg down and put it away.

“What’d it say?” asked Blaise.

“Here,” Draco said, giving him the piece of parchment. He said to Harry, “C’mon, let’s go shower.”

“Thanks, Theo,” Harry said, shivering.

“Don’t mention it,” Theo replied, settling back into his bed. “Although I’d appreciate it if you’d lend me the egg sometime. I’d like the chance to listen to it as well.”

“Done.”

“You could have listened just now,” Draco remarked.

“Too cold,” Theo said. “Warmer in a bath.”

Harry turned to Draco accusingly. “Why didn’t we think of that?!”

“Because you’re an idiot, Potter.”

“You’re the one who stuck your head in first, Malfoy.”

“And that’s the last time I’ll ever be so self-sacrificing —“

“Oh go have it out in the showers, you two,” Blaise cut in.

They left, still bickering.

***

“Hermione,” Harry asked, sliding into the seat next to her in Ancient Runes. “Do you know how to breathe underwater?”

Hermione, unfortunately, seemed extremely distracted and not at all like her usual self. She said, running a hand through her hair, which was frizzier than ever, “Breathing underwater? Why? What is it, Harry?”

“Are you okay?”

Hermione slammed her pot of ink onto the desk. “Why wouldn’t I be perfectly fine?”

“Well, it’s just, I saw the article —“

With a jagged laugh, Hermione said, “Of course you have! I mean, I mean …” She pressed her face into her palms. “It’s — it’s Hagrid, Harry. It’s so unfair how he’s been treated, and — I went down to the kitchens to talk to the elves with Dobby the other night, and it didn’t go so well. And …” She trailed off.

Harry leaned in closer, whispering, “You’re not still using a Time Turner somehow, are you?” The last time he’d seen her this stressed, she’d been living thirty-hour days.

“No, I’m not,” she said, still sounding upset. “But there’s just a lot going on, and with Viktor — I don’t want to let him down. He works really hard, you know.”

“Are you,” Harry asked tentatively, “happy with him?”

To his relief, she finally smiled tiredly. “Yeah. He’s good to me.”

“Okay.” Harry smiled back. “That’s good to hear.”

She leaned her head briefly on his shoulder. Then she sat back up and looked at him sharply. “What were you saying, about breathing underwater?”

“Oh, never mind.” Harry waved a hand dismissively. “I was just wondering, but don’t worry, I’ll work on it with Draco.”

“Draco,” she repeated, with that little frown she sometimes got when Harry mentioned him, and turned to look at the other side of the classroom. “Aren’t you sitting with him today?”

“Yeah.” Harry got up. “You’re definitely okay?”

“I’m great, Harry,” she reassured him, reaching out to squeeze his arm.

His glimpses of Hermione in class and in the Great Hall during mealtime over the next few weeks still showed her looking rather harassed, and it didn’t seem like she had made up with Ron, but Krum was with her often, as well as, Harry was surprised to see, Padma Patil. He had no idea how that had happened, but he was pleased that despite numerous obstacles she was managing to hold up as well as she could.

Lamentably, as the date of the Second Task approached, he found he had less and less energy to worry about other people.

“What does it mean,” he questioned for what felt like the hundredth time, “that it’ll take something I’ll miss?”

Across from him, Draco made no response; they had apparently exhausted his repertoire of sarcastic comments on this particular topic.

It was after dinner. They were in the library, researching ways for Harry to survive underwater for an hour. Draco had suggested that they ask Snape for help, but Harry had put his foot down: the cheating didn’t bother him, naturally, but even the imagined look of greasy smugness on Snape’s face was enough to motivate him to do his own legwork. And anyway, while it was a certain fact that Snape would have helped Draco, it was just as likely he would have laughed Harry out of his office, or assigned him detention for asking stupid questions.

“This would be easy,” Draco said, sitting back and rubbing his eyes, “if you were better at Transfiguration.”

“I can’t help it if it’s material we haven’t covered yet,” Harry said dispiritedly.

“Then I think the Bubble-Head Charm is still our best option after all.”

Draco had come up with the Bubble-Head Charm solution remarkably quickly; he said it was commonly used during advanced potions brewing to protect the brewer from any dangerous fumes. Harry had been dubious about its efficacy underwater, but when they had tried it it had worked without issue.

Without issue, save for the fact that even after hours of practice Harry couldn’t seem to hold it for longer than forty-five minutes consistently. His success rate with recasting the charm while submerged wasn’t promising, either: he had about a two in three chance of simply drowning.

The other major problem was that Harry did not know how to swim. Certainly, if he didn’t need to go up for air he could paddle his way slowly to his destination without problem, but there was the time limit, the nebulous threat of losing something important permanently.

“Perhaps,” Draco was saying now, as if talking to himself, “I should write to Father.”

“Oh that’ll go over well,” Harry muttered. “‘Please, Father, that pathetic Potter needs your help again, because he’s completely incapable of doing anything himself, despite being the vanquisher of the —‘“ he stopped abruptly, ducking his head back into the book in front of him.

They hadn’t talked about Lucius since the Yule Ball.

“We should have opened the egg sooner,” Draco said, letting the almost mention of Voldemort go without comment. “Then we might’ve had enough time to practise both the charm and teach you how to swim.”

Harry sighed. “As touched as I am that you would have been willing to jump into a partially frozen lake with me, Malfoy, I don’t think that would’ve worked too well.”

“I would have shouted instruction from the shore like a sensible person,” Draco argued. “As if I would willingly freeze to death with you, Potter. Dream on.”

Harry closed the book. It was useless. “I wish I could just grow some gills and fins like a fish.”

“That’s what I mean, if you were better at Transfiguration —“ Draco paused, getting that look on his face which said plainly that he had just had an idea. “Have you ever had Gillywater before?”

“You know I prefer Butterbeer,” Harry said. “Why?”

“Mother likes it,” Draco murmured. “So I sneaked some from her store once when I was young, and ended up falling asleep for about twenty hours.”

“I thought it was a mild drink? How old were you?”

“About five.” Draco tapped distractedly against the table. “Mother was a little upset with me.”

Harry grinned, picturing it.

“She made me promise never to drink it again until I was older,” Draco went on. “She said too much of it would make me grow gills and turn me into a fish.”

“Wait, really?” Harry asked, perking up. “Gillywater’s easy enough, we can order some from the Three Broomsticks —“

“I doubt she meant it,” Draco interrupted. “Gillywater interacts with your magic to subtly change your levels of oxygen intake for the purposes of inducing a pleasant dreamlike state. It doesn’t have any effect beyond that for teens or adults, and it doesn’t last very long unless say, you drank an entire barrel. In small children, the results may be amplified unpredictably due to differences in body mass and unstable infantile magic.”

Draco Malfoy, Harry thought (not for the first time), was such a massive swot. He said, “So what you’re interested in is the ingredients in Gillywater.”

Draco flashed an unstudied smile. “Five points to Slytherin. Go find me a book on Gillyweed, Potter. Go on.”

“Bossy prat,” Harry said, but he got up anyway.

***

Draco was the one who went and got the Gillyweed for him, and when Harry asked for his source Draco said that Harry was better off not knowing, which Harry took to mean that Draco had asked Snape, after all. He consoled himself with the argument that at least they had done the research themselves. Even though most of the brainwork had to be credited to Draco and Theo. In fact, pretty much all of it had to be, if he was being honest.

At any rate, Harry was the one who had to jump into the lake and battle merpeople, or whatever, so on the whole he didn’t feel very guilty about getting help. Especially since it was unimaginable that he was the only Champion who was doing so.

Everything was going as well as it could be, and he went to bed early the night before the Second Task, drawing the curtains to his four-poster bed closed even while the others were still chatting and going to and from the bathroom and Blaise was regaling anyone who would listen with an unlikely sounding story about his mother’s fifth husband.

The sounds of the dormitory had been unexpectedly soothing, and he had fallen asleep without much trouble (to his great surprise), and thus woke up early and well rested.

And saw as soon as he was up that Draco’s bed was empty. The sheets were undisturbed, the curtains drawn back.

A drop of ice formed at the base of his spine, as the words of the Mermish song floated hatefully through his mind.

The common room was also empty. Of course it was; it was five in the morning.

He went back to the dormitory and shook Greg awake urgently.

“Whazzit,” Greg mumbled groggily, squinting.

“Sorry, Greg,” he whispered. “Just — d’you know where Malfoy is?”

“Huh?” Greg peered blearily at Draco’s bed. “Huh.” Then his eyes widened. “Oh, s’right. Sixth-year came knocking last night, saying Snape wanted t’see him.”

“Snape?” Harry said. “You’re sure it was Snape?”

“Think so. Said it was urgent, but Malfoy didn’t look worried.” Greg yawned. “Thought he’d be back by now, though.”

“Yeah …” Harry muttered. “Thanks, Greg. Sorry again. It’s still early, go back to sleep.”

Had Draco procured the Gillyweed without asking for permission, and was Snape angry? Maybe that was it. Harry got dressed with speed and was outside the door to Snape’s private quarters before he had properly thought his actions through.

Snape would skin him alive if he knocked. But the lake was so cold still this time of year, and Draco —

Draco would have knocked.

After a few minutes of grim silence the door opened with a snap of magic. Snape was standing on the other side, fully dressed, scowling deeply.

“To what,” he said unpleasantly, “do I owe the displeasure, Potter?”

“Sir,” Harry said in a rush, “Malfoy, Draco, only I heard — sorry. I heard from Greg that you asked Malfoy to see you last night, and I just woke up, I mean I got up and Draco’s bed was empty —“

“Are you always this incapable of forming proper sentences, and this reliant on Mr Malfoy?” Snape’s expression hadn’t changed, save for the sardonic lifting of one eyebrow.

“No, I mean, it’s just that the Second Task —“ Harry swallowed — “if it’s about the Gillyweed, sir —“

“Stop babbling, Potter,” Snape interrupted again.

“So it’s not about the Gillyweed?”

“I’m sure I don’t know of what you speak, Potter.”

“Okay,” Harry said slowly, getting the message. “Okay. Then I don’t know either. Sorry, sir, I was babbling, as you said.”

“That much is abundantly clear.”

“But then, um, do you know where Draco is?”

Snape stared at him, as though he were taking time to judge Harry and finding him just as unworthy as he’d expected. “Mr Malfoy was summoned by me under the instruction of Professor Dumbledore. I would advise you, however, to not disturb the Headmaster and concentrate instead on your task today. Is that clear, Potter?”

_Too late, it’s gone, it won’t come back._

“Understood. Thank you, Professor,” Harry said, feeling as though the world were dropping away.

***

He skipped breakfast and went down early to the lake with the jar of Gillyweed, and sat there miserably by the shore until everyone arrived.

Lucius Malfoy, he had thought with desperation as he’d waited, would not tolerate anything happening to his son. Narcissa would tear the earth apart if anyone dared harm a hair on Draco’s head. That was certain.

But who knew what Dumbledore was capable of? He’d come down from the castle that he ruled over bearing his usual twinkling smile, and Harry could not read him at all. They had had a strange conversation at the end of first year, when Harry had been in the hospital wing, about choices and the unbearable weight of decision. Harry had gotten the unsettling impression that Dumbledore had been disappointed in him because he had not been able to retrieve the Philosopher’s Stone from the Mirror of Erised, as if Harry had failed spectacularly at some sort of test he had not known he was taking. And then at the end of second year, again: Fawkes the phoenix had come swooping into the Chamber in a flash of fire bearing, of all things, the Sorting Hat, and later in his office Dumbledore had made some obscure reference to a sword, as if he had expected Harry to — do what, exactly? He hadn’t explained. He never did.

Draco had gone down to the Chamber with him, but Dumbledore had not acknowledged Draco’s efforts the same way he had praised Hermione and Ron for accompanying Harry through the Stone’s protections in first year. It wasn’t like Dumbledore had made any negative statements about Draco — it was just that he had never said anything positive, either, like he was trying to maintain a facade of neutrality.

There were a lot of ways Harry could lose Draco without actually causing Draco any physical harm.

Before he could sort that realisation out, it was time to enter the water.

The day had dawned pink and turned grey, and the cloudy light did little to bring cheer to the lake’s depths. It was an eerie landscape, full of ghostly laughter and clawing Grindylows, shadows that darted out of sight as soon as he turned to look.

And then he found Draco.

Whether it was the spell Draco was under or the lake, all the colour had been sapped out of his face. He looked almost like a stranger. Harry swam up with a flick of his webbed feet and touched his hand to Draco’s cheek. It felt like skin, but there was no heat to it. It felt like the skin of a corpse.

All four of the — hostages, he supposed — looked like they could have been dead. Hermione, too, appeared as though she were a faded echo of herself. Harry wanted to throw up.

He was the only one there. The hour can’t have already been up. Frantically, he tried a cutting spell Draco had taught him on Draco’s ropes, feeling weak with relief when it actually worked, and pulled Draco’s body carefully away from the statue once he was free.

The merpeople tried to stop him when he moved to free Hermione as well, but he turned his wand on them without hesitation, snarling, and they backed away.

Just as he was trying to work out the best way to drag two bodies upward, negotiating with himself on whether he could manage three, Diggory showed up, looking as panicked as he felt.

That was that, then. Harry didn’t know the last girl — Diggory was freeing that Ravenclaw Seeker, Chang — but judging by looks alone she was related to Delacour. Once Draco and Hermione were safe, he could — come back for her. He felt sick thinking it, this discovery that he could balance lives on some internal scale and find that they were not at all equal. But: it was Hermione, who cared with a frightening intensity for everything, and who had kissed him gently on the cheek just two months ago. It was _Draco_, who — he couldn’t even begin to say.

Diggory was faster than him, since he was carrying only one person, but the webbed feet and hands the Gillyweed had given him made a substantial difference, and Harry was not far behind. He swam and dragged and propelled with a concentrated fury, and soon they were breaking the surface.

The last bit of tension he had been carrying dissipated when Draco and Hermione both instantly gasped for breath once their faces were in the air.

Draco took in the situation with barely a second’s delay and said, “Potter, you idiot.”

The Gillyweed hadn’t run out. Harry went back underwater to breathe.

When he came up again Hermione was saying, “… why he cares, but he does, so you could try being nicer.”

Draco was giving her a look that suggested he took issue with her criticism and also did not understand why she was allowed to speak to him at all.

Harry got their attention by splashing; he gestured downward, trying to communicate that he was going to return for Delacour’s hostage.

“Sorry, what, Harry?” Hermione said, pushing a wet strand of hair out of her eyes. “You mean how we got down there? Well Dumbledore —“

“Don’t be stupid,” Draco cut in. Hermione blinked angrily at him, looking insulted, but Harry knew that Draco was referring to him. “You don’t have to go down again. They’ll bring whoever’s left. C’mon. Let’s go back to shore. I can’t feel my toes.”

Delacour was already there, pacing backward and forward in front of the benches, turning to argue with Madam Maxime about going back down (Draco translated). Thankfully, just as Harry’s Gillyweed finally ran out, and he was settling down with towels and Pepper-Up, Krum surfaced, dragging with him the pale blonde girl, and Delacour cried with joy. She actually grabbed Krum by the shoulders and kissed him twice. Hermione, who had gone to Krum as soon as he was on land, stood next to them with her hands on her hips. The Pepper-Up coming out of her ears gave the impression that she was literally fuming with disapproval.

As they watched this spectacle, Draco asked mildly, “Did you really think that we were in real danger?”

“No,” Harry denied sulkily, plucking at the grass. “Yes.”

“Which is it?”

“Dumbledore,” Harry said obliquely, “doesn’t like you.”

“So? Doesn’t mean he can do anything to me.”

“I thought that he might —“ Harry grimaced. “Never mind. You’re right: I was being stupid.”

Draco gazed at him consideringly. His solemn expression was somewhat marred by the Pepper-Up. Harry presumed that he himself looked equally ridiculous.

“So as it turns out,” Draco announced finally, “I did nearly freeze to death for you, Potter. What’s my reward?”

He was blatantly trying to coax forth a smile. It was working. “What do you want?”

Draco leaned in closer. “We can start small.” There were still a few minute drops of lake water in his eyelashes. “I would like to be appropriately rich and famous. Since I’m going to inherit the Malfoy estate, you don’t have to worry about the first part. Then I’d like a comfortable position of power, one that has the Minister for Magic’s ear. And _then_ after that, it would be nice if a small country somewhere could build a temple in homage to me, where they will be obliged to worship at daily.”

Harry choked back a laugh. He said very seriously, copying Draco’s diction, “I’m sure we can manage that, but first you’re going to have to do something about your face by yourself, if we must subject it to the masses.”

“What’s wrong with my face?!” Draco demanded.

Harry smirked at him. “Oh, nothing.” He raised his hands, and, very slowly, giving Draco plenty of time to move away, brushed his thumbs gently over Draco’s eyes as he closed them, wiping his lashes dry.

They stared at each other: Draco swallowed. One, two. He cleared his throat and turned back to the lake. Voice unsteady, he commanded, “Get to it, Potter. I want that temple by the time I turn twenty.”


	5. Chapter 5

The relief of completing the Second Task without injury to himself or anyone he cared about was so great that it buoyed him up throughout the next few weeks, even when the workload leading to the Easter holidays increased to absurd levels.

“What do you expect?” Hermione said crossly, when he pointed this out. “We’re nearly in our OWLs year. It’s time to Work Hard!”

Draco’s reaction wasn’t much better, although he at least seemed to be planning to take it easy over the break. He was going back to the Manor for the week.

“Oh,” Harry said.

They were working on Ancient Runes homework together in the common room. Babbling had asked them to draft a basic runic scaffolding for a theoretical spell in a category of their choosing: creation, transference or destruction. Draco had been scribbling intently on his sheet of parchment for the past hour, barely paying attention to the conversation, even though he had initiated it.

He muttered rhetorically, while checking a reference in the Syllabary, “Doesn’t naudiz seem too weak to use in the outer circle? It does, doesn’t it?”

Harry, who was still trying to work out if he could get away with drawing only two circles (he really, really didn’t want to outline three), hummed neutrally.

“What are you using?”

“I’m doing transference, not creation,” Harry told him. “Can’t you just repeat it? One in each cardinal direction.”

“No, it’s not the anchor. Gyfu is better for that, since it reinforces symmetry.” Draco frowned and tapped his quill on his notes. Then his eyes narrowed and he looked up. “Aren’t you coming with me to the Manor?”

“Er. Am I?”

“Don’t give me that. Mother’s invited you. She always does.”

“I just thought, since you didn’t go back for Christmas —“

“You’re just going to rot away in the dungeons here, otherwise. I wager that you won’t even study.”

“Might be nice,” Harry said, affecting indifference. “I could get some peace and quiet, go for long walks, chat to Hagrid over tea now that he’s finally talking to people again …”

Draco made a derisive noise. “Come with me to the Manor, Harry. We’ll have some dinners with Mother and Father but otherwise they won’t bother you, I promise.”

Harry hesitated. “You’re sure you’d like me to?”

Draco, who didn’t enjoy being asked to repeat himself, said unequivocally, “I’m sure.”

***

Narcissa owled them a single Portkey: a statuette of a serpent, coiled in on itself, fast asleep. It was the same one she always liked to use.

It deposited them in the drawing room, which was as intimidatingly grandiose as ever. Outside the tall windows, the view was lush, deep greens and all the blushing shades of every opening flower: spring had come lovingly to Wiltshire, helped encouragingly along by the numerous spells and wards woven into the Manor grounds.

As Harry righted himself gracelessly, Narcissa rose from her position on an ornate chaise lounge situated in the slanting sunlight, and held out her arms for Draco.

“Mother,” Draco said, and the broad guileless smile was already in his voice. He strode up to her; they embraced.

“Darling,” she murmured warmly, and touched lightly his hair, the edge of his jaw. “You’ve grown taller.”

He had; he was the same height as her now.

They stood together like that for a short while, speaking in low voices. Harry looked away.

Eventually, Draco asked, “We’ll put Potter in the blue room?”

“The house elves have it ready,” Narcissa replied. She turned to Harry for the first time. “It’s a pleasure to have you with us again, Harry.”

“I’m grateful for your hospitality, Mrs Malfoy,” Harry said formally, fighting the urge to fidget.

That seemed to be enough. “Dinner will be at six,” Narcissa informed them, adding to Draco in an ambiguous tone: “Your father is in the west wing study.”

***

They had a tremendously restful week, right until the very last night, when Lucius Malfoy set a line of bait in the water and Harry was reeled in, and everything was ruined.

The weather was good; it rained intermittently, but it was an insubstantial, delicate rain that fell across the growing landscape like a caress. He and Draco spent the mornings flying over the grounds, racing each other across the treetops and then slowing down to a more leisurely speed to simply soak in the sensation of being airborne. An hour before lunch Draco would go and sit with Narcissa in the sun room, discussing whatever it was they discussed, and Harry would be left to wander the garden (mindful of the peacocks, which could be aggressive), or to revise for the exams (he never got very far).

The evenings were more varied: twice they went to the stables, where the Malfoys kept their Abraxans and Granians. Draco was not permitted to ride them, but the beasts recognised him and would come obediently when called to be petted and made much of and treated to fresh Granny Smiths imported from Australia. Harry favoured the Granians — they were generally more docile and accepting of less familiar wizards, and he liked to watch their lithe movements through the air. The Abraxans were sturdier and not as fast.

Another time, on Harry’s insistence, they did go for a long walk. An incredibly long one, all the way down past the outskirts of the Malfoy property on the southern side into Muggle territory. There wasn’t much to see; it was mostly farmland dotted with sheep and cows, a dirt road in the far distance. They jumped the fences and trod through the slightly muddy terrain, getting their robes dirty, but didn’t see a single human the entire time they were there.

Other afternoons were spent indoors. Draco’s French book, which Harry had seen little of during the school year, made a reappearance. Draco was rereading it, but he offered no further explanation as to its contents.

“What’s the story about?” Harry asked.

“Story?”

“The book. You said it was a novel.”

“It’ll bore you, Potter.”

It didn’t appear to be boring Draco. Exasperated, Harry stopped poking. He had found a scroll of peculiar spells in the Malfoy library which did not seem to be Dark or otherwise pertain to violent dismemberment, and so took to practising those idly while Draco read.

To Harry’s great relief, they were required to take dinner in the main dining room only three times. The other nights were less formal affairs: he and Draco ate alone on the large balcony adjoined to Draco’s room, or they sat at a smaller table with Narcissa in the east wing where she would direct the conversation elegantly towards topics like the new hedge maze pattern she was thinking of cultivating in the garden, or an art gallery that had recently opened in wizarding space in Venice. So all in all, Harry only saw Lucius three times during his stay.

The first two times, Lucius had barely spoken. He had nodded to Harry to acknowledge his presence, and offered commentary when the talk had shifted to Draco’s performance in school, but on the whole he had given a distinct impression of immense preoccupation.

Thus, Harry had been rather unusually relaxed on the night before they were due back at Hogwarts, as he sat down next to Draco at the long hardwood table and the first course of soup materialised in front of them.

They made it all the way to the end of the main course before Lucius bared his teeth and remarked to Harry, “I hear that Draco wasn’t the only person you brought up from the lake.”

“You’ll have to forgive him, Father,” Draco said with a studied nonchalance. “He didn’t realise that it didn’t matter, that there was no danger.”

“But of course it matters,” Lucius disagreed crisply. “Especially when the girl is a Mudblood.”

“She was Viktor Krum’s hostage —“

“I’m not speaking to you, Draco.”

Draco closed his mouth with a snap.

Taking his time, Harry took up his napkin and wiped at his lips, then folded it neatly and pushed it back under his plate.

He said, staring Lucius straight in the eye: “Hermione Granger is my friend, too.”

“Does it not occur to you,” Lucius replied superciliously, “that you implicitly lowered the status of my son when you put his life on equal balance with that which has lesser blood than ours?”

Harry grit his teeth, but he couldn’t not say it: “Yours, or mine?”

Draco drew in a hissing breath.

Harry went on, “You’re perfectly aware that my mother also had, as you call it, lesser blood.”

“Her marriage to your father elevated her, even if the Potters cannot be counted amongst the Sacred Twenty-Eight. That you carry a name that extends back for generations of wizards, generations of magic unbroken, elevates you.”

As the already concrete silence thickened, dessert was served. Narcissa was the only one who picked up her spoon to crack the shell of thin chocolate and sample the sweet insides.

She said evenly, putting the spoon back down, “A Muggleborn cannot be conscious of the true history of magic, which stretches back to the first sunrise, the birth of the world. What we find innate they must learn by rote, and what they cannot learn they must discard, and when that happens, knowledge is lost year by year, decade by decade, century by century, as they cross the border and corrupt our lines.”

“To live is to change,” Harry said.

“I understand the concept, Harry,” Narcissa responded without malice. “And I agree. But it is a question of disintegration versus preservation. You are young, and you have had sparingly little chance to learn of our loss. Draco tells me that you are writing to cousin Sirius. He is the last male scion of the House of Black. Do you know what that means? Do you know what it is, to vanish? The sorrow of it sent Aunt Walburga to her grave before her time. She thought it her own failure.”

“Hermione is a studious know-it-all,” Harry said heavily, closing his eyes and opening them again with deliberation. “She read every single book about magic she could get her hands on _at least_ twice before she ever stepped foot on Platform 9¾, and she’s top of our year. She’ll help you even if she doesn’t like you. She told me she never fit in with her peers before she came to Hogwarts, and if you say to her that she doesn’t understand something she’ll study and study and study and _learn_ it to prove you wrong. She doesn’t want to destroy centuries of wizarding knowledge or culture. She has magic. It’s her world, too.”

“It cannot be,” Lucius intoned. “She is only a broken link, connected to nothing and no one.”

“She’s my _friend_,” Harry insisted again helplessly. “I’m connected to her. How do you propose to drive her out?”

Lucius’ mouth twisted, in the exact same way Draco’s always did.

“Because,” Harry continued vehemently, “history can be recorded, and as I recall in our recent history, attempting to drive out Muggleborns didn’t —“

“Harry,” Draco whispered.

“— go so well for you. And I think it would be stupid of you to stick so unmovingly to that mindset, that you can just — just get rid of things that you find personally distasteful, instead of —“

“_Harry_,” Draco said again, much louder. To Narcissa, he asked, “May we be excused?”

“I’m not done,” Harry said to the table at large.

“You were not there, during the war,” Lucius said, an icy fire in his eyes.

“I was the one,” Harry told him harshly, “who ended it.”

“Not through any merit on your part, I imagine.”

“No,” Harry agreed. “It was my mother, the Muggleborn.”

They seemed finally to be getting to the real heart of the issue. Lucius pushed aside his dish and leaned forward. “And what would you do, Harry Potter, if there was another war? End that one, too?”

“Yes.”

“Really?” Lucius looked considering. “And what if you cannot pull up two bodies from the lake? What if you could only save one?”

“I —“ Harry began, breathing fast. “I’d save both.”

“You can’t.”

“I can.”

“If the Mudbloods live, we die. If you choose your friend Granger, you forsake Draco. That is the choice.”

“It’s _not_,” Harry exclaimed.

“I heard as well,” Lucius said, “that there was another girl whom you did not save. You left her down there because you knew it was impossible, and you chose what was most important to you.”

“I —“

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Lucius continued relentlessly. “In fact, I was reassured to hear it, because it means you do understand, after all.”

Harry put his head in his hands. There was such a rushing in his ears, in his head, he couldn’t _think_.

There was the sound of wood knocking against stone. Draco had pushed back his chair and stood up. He said, “Thank you, Father, Mother, for the lovely dinner. It’s getting late. We should retire.”

“All right, Draco,” said Narcissa’s calm voice. “You may leave.”

“C’mon,” Draco muttered. His hand came down on Harry’s collar and tugged, and in this manner Harry was half-dragged, stumbling, out through the large, beautifully carved oak doors that opened for their passing into the cold corridor.

***

Harry slammed into Draco’s room and collapsed directly into Draco’s reading chair, kneading his eyes.

“Harry,” said Draco’s voice.

“I know you agree with him,” Harry said despairingly. “Right now, Draco, I don’t want to hear it.”

“I never said I agree —“

“You _do_,” Harry interjected. “When have you ever spoken to Hermione or ever acted properly like she existed? You don’t even like to _look_ at her.” He raised his head. Draco had sat down on the edge of his bed, some paces away. “Why don’t you ever say her name?”

Draco’s lips thinned. “I just … I don’t like her.”

“Because she’s Muggleborn.”

“Because — look. I know that she’s helped you a lot, and I know that she’s good to you, and —“ Draco paused, looking pained — “that she cares for you.”

“But,” Harry supplied for him.

“But,” Draco said, “she’s not —“

“Pureblood?”

“Would you let me finish,” Draco bit out.

“Fine.”

“When I was two months old,” Draco recounted tensely, “I levitated an extremely expensive vase over the balustrade and smashed it into pieces. It had held an enchantment that taught the flowers placed within it to glow according to the cycles of the moon, and could not be fixed with a simple _Reparo_. Grandfather Abraxas laughed as he hardly ever did, and Father carried me joyfully through the hall of portraits and told them the story, and Mother took me to visit Great Aunt Walburga, who put me in her lap and cried. The memories are stored in the family Pensieve; I’ve seen them.”

Harry brought his feet up onto the seat, hugging his knees.

Draco persisted: “I understand that to you magic may seem like a gift, or like a key. It’s not. It’s what we are, what I am. To have it is to be, and to be without it is to be nothing. The great houses of old understood this intrinsically, and they understood it all the more when the Muggles took us to the stake and burnt us.”

“I thought that — the burnings weren’t real?”

“They did it to children,” Draco said shortly. “It was real enough. Why do you think there is an International Statute of Secrecy? Who do you think it protects more?”

Scrubbing at his hair, Harry sighed shakily and said, “Even so, that doesn’t mean — it can’t mean that it’s okay therefore to kill Muggles, to murder Muggleborn.”

“I never said it was.”

“But you don’t like them.”

They stared at each other. “I don’t like them.”

Harry whispered, “If there was a second war, what would you do?”

A stricken expression crossed Draco’s face.

“Who would you pull up from the lake, Draco?”

Draco said, as if each word were a fracture he was setting into place, “I would want you safe.”

“Even though,” Harry said, voice raw, “we’re not alike?”

“We are,” Draco asserted.

“Whenever my magic manifested, the Dursleys tried to beat it out of me. Hermione’s parents love her, but in this I’m still far more similar to her than I am to you: I grew up with Muggles, and then magic was the key, as you say, that let me in. If you think we’re alike, then it follows that Hermione is the same, too.”

Draco pushed off from the bed, agitated. “She’s not. You’re a Potter.”

“I’d still be me,” Harry shouted, “if I had a different name!”

“No,” Draco contended, “you really wouldn’t. Just as I wouldn’t be me if I weren’t a Malfoy. That’s how this works, Harry. Your name has a history. It ties you inextricably to everyone who came before you, who lived so that you could be born.”

“Are you saying,” Harry questioned dangerously, “that if my last name had been Granger we would not have become friends?”

Draco’s fists were closed at his sides, the knuckles bone-white. “No, I don’t think we would have.”

Harry stood up, too. Dimly, he registered that he had sent the reading chair crashing to the ground. “Then maybe we’re not friends right now, _Malfoy_.”

As soon as he said it and saw the distress in Draco’s eyes he regretted it, but there was no way to take it back.

Through his teeth, Draco pleaded, “Listen to me —“

“No, I don’t think so.” Harry went to the door, yanking it open. “You never wanted to listen to what Lucius did in second year to Ginny Weasley. You never — if you won’t, then I won’t.”

Draco had given him numerous tours of the Manor. There was a fireplace on the third floor sitting room, and, resting on the mantlepiece, a bowl of Floo powder. He seized a handful, spilling some. His entire body was shaking.

The Floo network was already connected in anticipation of their return early next morning. As he stepped into the roaring green flames and asked for the Slytherin common room, Draco appeared in the doorway, his face pale and drawn.

Harry shut his eyes.


	6. Chapter 6

“So the two of you aren’t speaking,” Pansy summarised, leaning against the window and buffing her nails.

Harry didn’t bother to reply.

“Oh, what, you’re too good to talk to me as well now?” She waved a hand in front of his face.

Still Harry said nothing.

Pansy groaned. “You’re just as impossible as he is.”

Harry asked, “Did you ever talk to Hermione again, after the Yule Ball?”

“Is that what you fought about?” Pansy inquired keenly. “Granger?”

“No,” Harry said forcefully.

“We haven’t talked, if you must know.” She inspected her cuticles, pursing her lips. “She’s gotten all chummy with —“ momentarily, her face shuttered — “Padma, and so I thought I’d better keep away.”

“You could be friends, couldn’t you?”

“With — Granger?” Pansy asked uncertainly.

“Could you?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Why not?”

She gave a half-shrug. “I don’t know that we have a lot in common.”

“Because she’s Muggleborn?”

Pansy shot him an irritated glare. “Honestly, what is it with you and Draco? I wish you would hurry and sort it out. All of this consultation is incredibly bad for my skin. Yes, Harry, I don’t have a lot in common with Granger because she’s Muggleborn, not to mention a _Gryffindor_, and also because she semi-permanently carries around half the library in her bag, and because she seems scarily enthusiastic about healthy gums. You have to admit that’s unnatural.”

Dispiritedly, Harry knocked his head against the glass. It was difficult to not think of the lake when it was always there around him in the Slytherin dungeons.

“Merlin and Morgana,” Pansy exclaimed. “It’s like you can’t even laugh if he’s not here.”

Harry absolutely was capable of laughing even if he and Draco were no longer friends, and he proved it the week after when he passed by Ron Weasley in the corridors, laughing uproariously when Ron said, “Ready up Dean, here comes our One True Champion.”

It was so funny, he couldn’t seem to stop.

“Er,” said Thomas. “Potter, are you okay?”

Even Ron looked taken aback. “Think maybe there are potions fumes down there in the dungeons that’s done him in?”

“Hey,” Harry said, still laughing. “Hey, Ron. You’re a Weasley. Weasleys are one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight. What’s up with that?”

“Might be fumes, yeah,” Thomas commented. “Should we take him to the hospital wing?”

“I’m perfectly fine!” Harry shouted, and then brought his voice back down. “Answer my question.”

“Don’t know if the hospital wing would help with this,” was Ron’s verdict.

“If you’re blood traitors, how come you haven’t married any Muggles? Why’s that? Explain to me how this stupid shit all works.”

Ron seemed to be intrigued despite himself. His brow furrowed as he thought. “I think we probably do have some Muggles in the family tree somewhere. Or was it a Squib? Might’ve been a Muggleborn. Though we definitely have a Squib. I’d have to ask Dad.”

“You don’t even know,” Harry gasped, another happy bubble of laughter escaping his mouth. Ron was hilarious.

“It’s a large family tree,” Ron said defensively.

“That’s right,” Harry rejoined. “Because it’s all about connections, isn’t it? You’re all connected.”

“What are you talking about?” Thomas asked.

Harry’s attention snapped to him. “You’re a Muggleborn, aren’t you, Thomas?”

“The fuck?” Thomas backed away.

Ron was staring at Harry with disquiet. “He doesn’t know. He might be a halfblood.”

“Great,” Harry said, “fantastic.”

“Keep me out of this,” Thomas warned.

“Did Malfoy do something?” Ron wanted to know.

Harry yelled at him, “Why do people always think it’s to do with Malfoy?”

Thomas and Ron glanced at each other. “Isn’t it?”

“Fuck Malfoy,” Harry spat.

“Can’t argue there,” Ron said, eyes wide.

Harry gulped in a trembling breath and shoved past the two of them, not even bothering to apologise when he spilled Thomas’ textbooks to the floor.

Really, fuck Malfoy, he thought viciously as the dates tumbled into May and the temperature rose, and the circles under Draco’s eyes got darker and darker and they still said not one word to each other.

Fuck Malfoy, he thought when he went down to the Quidditch pitch which they were ruining for the stupid tournament and was accosted by a raving Bartemius Crouch begging for Dumbledore.

Fuck Malfoy, he thought after he got up from the floor of the Ancient Runes classroom, having just seen Wormtail scream, waving aside Hermione’s concern as she put her hand on his arm and Draco was just standing there on the other side, terror pounding across his face as plain as day, and Harry was the only one looking.

“I think you need to talk to him,” Hermione said that night in the library. “Isn’t it his birthday soon?”

“Why should I talk to him,” Harry said resentfully, “if he won’t talk to you?”

Hermione shut the book she was reading with a curt snap. “I’m not an excuse, Harry. Don’t treat me like I am.”

“I’m not,” Harry said, distraught.

“All right,” Hermione said after a pause. “Okay, but you have to agree: this is killing you. Whatever it is, you can work it out.”

“We’ve never been able to work it out,” Harry whispered morosely to the blank parchment in front of him. “Not once, since the moment we met. We just pretended it wasn’t there.”

“Ron came to talk to me.” At that, Harry looked up. “Yes, I know. After all this time. He said he was worried about you.”

Harry scrubbed at his eyes. His head hurt. “Ron’s a good bloke.”

“He can be decent when he gets his head unstuck from his behind,” Hermione agreed primly. “But that’s not what I meant.” She hesitated. “Will you talk about it with me? What _did_ the two of you argue about?”

Harry affected a brutal jerk of his shoulder that did not seem to convince Hermione of how much he didn’t care. “He’s the son of a Death Eater. I’m the Boy Who Lived. Take a guess.”

“Oh, Harry.”

“It’s stupid. We shouldn’t have been friends in the first place.”

In response to this statement Hermione sighed disapprovingly, but she only asked, “How did you two…? I always was curious.”

Harry inked his quill and squiggled a line. “He was, oh, standing in Madam Malkin’s, getting his Hogwarts robes pinned.”

“And then you became friends?”

“Well, no. We met again later on the train while I was looking for somewhere to sit, and he just sort of acted like it was obvious I should sit with him, and I thought, you know, he’s kind of full of himself but everyone seemed to know everyone else already, and I was alone. So. And then he found out I was Harry Potter and his eyes went wide like —“ he stopped, unable to go on.

Hermione was gazing at him with a small sorrowful smile. He bristled, because in the sorrow was understanding.

“What you said earlier,” Hermione murmured, “about his not talking to me. That’s not quite true.”

“What d’you mean?”

“He did come talk to me once,” Hermione explained. “In second year. He gave me this huge lecture about how you weren’t the one who was petrifying students and he knew the genealogy back ten generations and was highly sceptical you could be the Heir of Slytherin. He said the attacks were driving you crazy, and that I was making it worse by not helping you.”

“He said that?” A thick drop of ink splashed down messily.

Impatiently, Hermione replied, “Why would I make it up? He certainly wasn’t very nice about it, every second word was an insult and if it wasn’t it was said like it could have been.”

And Harry hadn’t known.

He hadn’t known, and it wasn’t like — it wasn’t like it fixed things, exactly, but a seed of guilt took root and grew. Life is change, he had told Narcissa, and then he had looked at her son and seen overlaid on Draco’s face the face of his father. Your name didn’t matter, he had claimed heroically, but it was Harry himself who had always been painfully aware that it was Draco _Malfoy_, as soon as he had learnt what it meant. Maybe it was Draco who was right after all, and Harry who was mistaken. You could not be only yourself: you were everything that came before you, carried on your shoulders, never to be let go, and sometimes that history was heavy enough to crush.

Draco’s birthday came and went. Harry told himself he was too busy practising spells for the Third Task to worry about it anyway, and swallowed the lump in his throat when he got back late that night to the dormitory and saw the faint glow of _Lumos_ through Draco’s curtains, heard the sound of Draco turning pages, probably still reading that stupidly mysterious French book.

It was like that for the next two and a half weeks: keeping busy, clutching at excuses. When Draco was in the common room Harry made sure to be elsewhere, and in their shared classes he either sat with Hermione or Theo. When Draco yawned at the breakfast table he made no comment about the dangers of sleep deprivation, and when their eyes accidentally met out of habit he was the first to turn away.

And then, then the Third Task brought with it the rebirth of Voldemort, and it was too late to take it all back and redo anew.

***

Voldemort, as it turned out, did not take kindly to his followers entertaining Harry Potter at their dinner table. Lucius Malfoy took a long time to get up after the protracted Cruciatus.

“Lucius, my friend,” whispered Voldemort in that voice of his that belonged in a tomb, “you are lucky, after all. You will live and have the opportunity to serve again …”

“Thank you, my Lord,” said Lucius to the ground.

“You are especially lucky, as it was through the serendipitous efforts of your son that young Harry Potter is delivered to me today …”

Harry twitched.

“Yes,” Voldemort said, laughing. “How unexpected, that the two of them are friends. I will have use for the both of you yet, Lucius. My faithful servant will be taking good care of Draco as we speak.”

Fruitlessly, Harry wrenched at his bindings. Voldemort gave no indication of noticing, and continued to circle along his ring of Death Eaters, posturing.

Harry wished almost that he had taken the Cup with Diggory, had allowed Diggory his moment of nobility — but when Diggory had insisted that Harry take it instead, he had heard in his head a familiar drawl in a sneering tone and had grasped the handle without further ado. It was just a stupid trophy, for a stupid tournament. Why shouldn’t he win? He’d done it all, hadn’t he, even though he had never wanted to participate in the first place?

If they’d taken the Cup together, maybe Diggory would be here, would be able to help. How Harry dearly wished he could have had help.

Yet he did get help later, when the ghosts appeared. His mother, his father.

“Be ready, Harry,” said Lily Potter, as an ethereal wind tugged at her features and she looked at him with love.

Harry held on and said desperately, “Mum. Dad.”

“Sweetheart,” Lily replied, her head at his shoulder but her presence somehow distant, as if they were separated by an immense gulf. “What is it?”

“I,” Harry choked out, “I wish …”

“We know, son,” reassured James. “We know.”

“You have to do it now,” Lily told him. “There’s no more time.”

“Go on, Harry,” James encouraged. “Live on. Live well.”

And the golden thread broke, and Harry was running, heedless of the high-pitched pain in his leg and the cut on his arm and the fissure in his heart, Summoning forth the Cup, whirling through the turbulent nothing of compressed space back to Hogwarts.

***

Dumbledore was calling him. He could hear Diggory’s voice too, filled with relief.

“Draco,” Harry said weakly. “Where’s Draco?”

“What happened, Harry?” asked Dumbledore, reaching down and lifting him up with extraordinary strength.

“Voldemort’s back,” Harry told him. “Where’s Draco?”

“In the stands,” replied Dumbledore.

Fudge had appeared; he grabbed at Harry and said a lot of things in quick succession, then turned to Dumbledore and continued.

“Professor,” Harry interrupted, swaying violently on the spot. “Please. There’s a Death — a servant of his here at Hogwarts. I need to find Draco.”

Dumbledore’s eyes flashed, indicating he had heard, but Fudge was still talking to him, and then Diggory’s hand was on Harry’s shoulder, and Diggory was saying, “Merlin, Harry, you just disappeared in front of me. What happened?”

“Voldemort happened.” Diggory flinched. Harry fought against the urge to vomit from a sudden wave of vertigo and asked, “Have you seen Draco? Can you, can you help me to the stands?”

Diggory, who had not been overtly friendly towards Harry but who was otherwise fair and kind, said, “Here,” and put Harry’s arm around his shoulders and helped him limp to the bottom of the stands. There were people everywhere, some of them shrieking, others conversing excitedly. Harry blinked: he was seeing double.

“Harry,” said a voice, and he turned to see Hermione bounding down towards him. She took in the sight of him with a look of horror. “Oh my god, Harry. You need to go to the hospital wing.”

“Draco,” Harry whispered, sagging against Diggory. “Where…?”

Hermione, trusty Hermione, immediately pointed to a spot on the stands. “He was sitting over there with Parkinson. He’s not there now …”

“I need to find him. Will you help me?”

“Of course,” Hermione said.

“I’ll help, too,” Diggory offered.

“Thanks,” said Harry. “Let’s —“

“Where do you think you’re going, Potter?” came the voice of Snape.

“He needs the hospital wing, sir,” said Hermione, clearly trying to throw Snape off.

But Harry, if anything, was relieved that Snape had appeared. “Sir,” he got out with effort, “we need to find Draco. There’s a Death Eater in Hogwarts.”

“A Death Eater in Hogwarts,” drawled Snape. “Imagine that.”

“You’re — you’re not, are you?” Harry said, trying to think through the pain.

“Enough,” interjected Snape. He said to Diggory, “That will be all, Mr Diggory. Your father was looking for you.”

With a wave of his wand, Snape levitated Harry and began to draw him towards the castle. Hermione, after a pause, jogged to keep up.

“Tell me what happened as concisely as you can manage,” ordered Snape as he strode forward, and so Harry did. Hermione gasped repeatedly and at one point gave a real cry of distress, but Snape made no sound as he listened. His right hand grasped the forearm of his left, and his hand which held his wand was immobile in a way which suggested great strain.

By the time they slammed into the Entrance Hall, Harry had nearly finished. He didn’t feel a pressing need to speak in detail about the ghosts of his parents, and fast forwarded to the end.

Hermione asked, “Sir, do you know where we’re going?”

“Who else, Miss Granger, do you think it could be?” Snape only said unhelpfully, but Harry, remembering the encounters over the year, was getting an inkling.

He was proven right when they blasted into Moody’s office with _Stupefy_ and there Draco was, his face pressed against the floor, not moving.

“Draco,” Harry breathed out, and Snape had the good graces to let him to the ground, moving instead to examine and bind the unconscious form of Moody, who had been hit cleanly in the chest by the Stunning Spell.

Draco was alive, but though his heartbeat was coming rabbit-quick he would not open his eyes. There was dried spittle on his chin and both his hair and his robes were a mess, which seemed to indicate that he had —

“Cruciatus,” said Harry, who had just barely an hour before seen multiple live demonstrations on humans, and suffered through it himself. Neither Lucius nor Harry had lost consciousness, though.

“Granger,” snapped Snape. “You must send for Madam Pomfrey.”

“Yes, sir.” Hermione left right away.

Harry knelt by Draco, unsure what to do.

“Don’t move him,” instructed Snape, a hollow look in his eyes. “In case he has broken anything.”

Swallowing, Harry said, “It’s my fault.”

“Save me your useless moping, Potter.”

It was the sort of acerbic thing Draco might have said, except he would have softened it with a lazy smirk. With Snape it just sounded uncaring and cruel. Harry sat back and tried to keep himself under control.

Not long after, Hermione returned with Madam Pomfrey, as well as Dumbledore and McGonagall.

“Harry,” Dumbledore said gravely as Pomfrey conjured stretchers for them both, “you did well to return alive tonight.”

“But not well enough,” Harry said.

***

It took two days for Draco to wake up. By then, Harry’s injuries had already been healed, although there was a bone-deep fatigue in his system he could not seem to shake. That might have been because he had spent almost all of his time in the chair next to Draco’s bed in the hospital wing, refusing to leave even when Dumbledore had come with an explanation of Moody’s origins, and his untimely Kiss.

Draco woke up with a jerk, a raw scream fighting its way past his dry lips.

“Draco,” Harry said at once. “Hush, it’s okay.”

Draco’s shoulders jolted rigidly against the metal bedframe and for a terrible few seconds he stared at Harry without recognition. But then, finally, he did relax, his pupils contracting, his breath evening.

Harry offered him a glass of water; he took it, drank in thirsty gulps, coughed, and drank again until it was empty.

“You disappeared,” was the first thing he said.

“It,” Harry began. “The — the Cup. It was a Portkey. Draco. You’ve been out of it for a couple of days.”

Draco winced and answered the unspoken question: “I remember. Tell me what happened to you.”

They exchanged stories; Draco’s was quite simple. Moody — or rather Crouch Jr — had cast Imperius on him and coerced him back to the office as soon as Harry had vanished and the confusion begun, and once there he had been given a garbled half-explanation of Voldemort’s plan and his obedience demanded with the threat of danger to his family.

“Maybe,” Draco said, once they were done, “this is all a mistake.”

“What is?” Harry asked with dread.

“This,” Draco elaborated, gesturing. “Us. Maybe you should have been in Gryffindor instead, where Dumbledore obviously wanted you to be.”

“Don’t be stupid.”

“You’re the one who said we weren’t friends.”

“Draco,” Harry whispered, and seized his wrist. “We are. I was wrong.”

“_Father_ was at the gathering, you said. And Crabbe, and Goyle, and Nott.”

“Yes,” Harry said. “Crawling for their lives. For the lives of their families.”

“Saving our own skins.”

That couldn’t be denied.

Draco went on, “How are we supposed to — to work, if Father’s got the Dark Mark and you’re —“ he waved at Harry with his free hand — “whatever you are?”

Harry was beginning to feel kind of annoyed. He’d actually forgotten how Draco had this effect on him whenever he was choosing to be as prattish as possible. “Are you saying all this to prove a point?”

Draco stared at him unreadably. “I don’t like Muggles or the Muggleborn, Potter.”

“Thanks for the hourly update,” Harry said dryly.

Rudely, Draco snapped his fingers at him, as if to imply that it was Harry who had been asleep for over forty hours. “What? You suddenly don’t care anymore? Because I think I’d better disabuse you cleanly of the notion now, if you think one day I’m going to subscribe wholly to your moral beliefs and become exactly the sort of person you want. Our relationship can’t be contingent on that, Harry. It won’t work.”

“What sort of person is it that I want?” Harry asked, tilting his head.

“Someone who’s not me, obviously,” Draco answered crossly.

“Right. And what do you want? Do you want to go our separate ways? Volde — _fine_, the stupid Dark Lord, His Noseless Eminence — wants you to go crawling as well.”

Silence. Then: “I can’t just leave Father to fend for himself.”

“I’m not asking you to,” Harry said, tugging on the wrist. “Surely Lucius doesn’t enjoy it either? Couldn’t we — I mean, Dumbledore must have safehouses —“

Draco made a disbelieving noise. “If you think Father trusts Dumbledore one whit, or that Dumbledore’s support comes without cost, you haven’t been paying attention for the past four years.”

“Okay, fine. How about —“ inspiration struck — “a Fidelius Charm?”

“For,” Draco asked, brow furrowing, “the Manor?”

“Why not?”

“The _entire_ Manor, including the grounds? Really?”

Uncertain, Harry said, “Would it not work?”

“Do you know how complex that spell is, to set the boundaries and weave them into the Secret Keeper’s being?” Draco demanded. “Do you know how hard it would be to undo?!”

“Er. No?”

“Neither do I,” Draco admitted readily, the bastard. “But I doubt it’s easily achievable.”

“Can’t you at least discuss it with your parents?”

“It would be difficult enough to talk to Father about deflecting, let alone convince the both of them to put the Manor into a semi-permanent unknowable, unplottable state. And then once it’s done they’ll have to confine themselves there, to be safe.”

“But they’ll be safe,” Harry argued.

Draco shook his head, but it wasn’t in dismissal. He looked pensive.

“Your parents,” Harry offered tentatively, “haven’t visited since you were — since you. Well. I’m sure they wanted to.”

“Of course they wanted to,” Draco said offhandedly. “What date is it?”

Harry’s wand was on his own bedside table, too far to reach without moving. He grabbed Draco’s instead and cast, answering, “Very early morning on the 27th.”

“I need to go home as soon as possible.”

“Do you want me to get Madam Pomfrey…?”

“When the sun rises.” Draco moved his wrist backward, so that Harry’s hand pressed against his palm instead. “Harry, I don’t think I can invite you over for the summer.”

Harry snorted.

“I don’t think we’ll be able to see each other at all until September. I might not be able to owl, either,” Draco went on, completely serious. Then his expression did grow mocking, and he added, “Do you think you’ll be able to cope without my wisdom and guidance?”

Rolling his eyes, Harry said, “I’ll live.”

“You’d better,” Draco replied, once again sincere.

“So …” Harry ventured.

“What?”

“Are we still fighting?”

“I don’t know, Potter, you’re the one who started it. Are we?”

Harry laughed, properly for what felt like the first time in ages, as indeed it had been, and he pressed his face into the cotton hospital bedsheets, squeezing Draco’s hand, feeling Draco squeeze back.

***

For the first time ever, Harry rode the Hogwarts Express back to London with Ron and Hermione, who had apparently made up thanks to Harry’s nervous breakdown in the corridor several weeks ago.

About two hours in, the compartment door slid open to reveal Pansy. She gave a histrionic cry and threw herself half onto Harry’s lap, moaning melodramatically about how she could not spend one more second in Blaise Zabini’s presence.

“He has this magazine,” she wailed into the horrified silence, “with these pictures. There’re a lot of metal rings, where metal rings should not be. Harry, you have no idea.”

“Er,” Harry said with stunning eloquence, patting her consolingly on the back.

“Also,” she said, pushing herself up and holding out a hand for his stash of Every Flavour Beans, “I wanted to tell you — I got an owl from Draco.”

“Oh.”

“Terribly impolite of him to leave without even saying goodbye,” Pansy continued. “But I forgive him. You forgave him too, as I heard.” She raised an eyebrow pointedly.

“Sorry,” Harry said, ducking his head. He had been busy for the last few days, visiting Dumbledore to talk about the Malfoys (however much Draco might have been right, Harry still felt it was necessary), trying to talk with Theo, Greg and Vincent about what was happening, trying nervously to ascertain who else might have been the children of Death Eaters. There hadn’t been much time for Pansy.

“As you should be,” she said with a sniff. “Don’t forget, Potter: I run the mill. It’s my mill.”

“I know,” Harry reassured her.

“Slytherins,” muttered Ron darkly.

“Oh, what’s this?” Pansy turned to him, crossing her legs. “Weasley. What a surprise to see you in here, existing.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“And Granger,” Pansy added. As Hermione opened her mouth she held up a stalling hand. “Please. I don’t want to hear more about ways to prevent tooth decay and gum disease. Tell me instead about your Krum-shaped conquest.” She leered. “_Was_ it a conquest?”

Ron turned purple and shifted to stare out the window.

Hermione blushed and said shyly, “Well, I’m visiting him over summer, and then maybe next year we thought we might try long-distance.”

“I see,” Pansy said significantly.

Ron made a pitiable sound against the glass.

“Chin up, Weasley,” Pansy barked. “I cannot be in the presence of pathetic.”

There was an opportunity there for a scathing remark that Draco would have had no hesitation in taking. Pansy had no doubt left it in deliberately for Harry’s benefit. Harry just sat back, saying nothing, and after a moment Pansy did as well, sighing at him.

“You _are_ a bleeding heart,” she said, and looped her arm through his companionably.

Ron was looking at them with a mixture of disgust and fascination. He said accusingly, “I thought you were going out with Malfoy.”

“Who?” Pansy asked curiously. “Me, or Harry?”

Ron choked. “You! Obviously.”

“Why is that obvious?”

“Because —“ Ron sputtered. “Because you were his date for the Yule Ball!”

“Ah.” Pansy snuggled in closer. Harry didn’t need to see the smirk to know it was there. “But Harry and I discovered our deep romantic love for each other during a night of delightful decadence in the dungeons, Weasley, and when we told Draco about our passion he was happy to share.”

“What?” Ron said, looking like he was on verge of apoplexy. “You — what?”

“Calm down, Ron,” Hermione said with exasperation. “None of them are going out together.”

“Oh? Is that so, Granger?”

“I know that you and Malfoy at the ball was just a one-time thing, Parkinson.”

Pansy returned, “Nonsense, we’re destined for each other,” but she was losing steam. She laughed. “Merlin, Weasley, you’re such a prude.”

“Would you have liked to go out with Malfoy?” Harry asked her.

“Time and place and people, Harry,” she admonished. Then leaned in very close and whispered lowly, so that only he could hear: “Yes.”

Harry blinked.

“Anyway,” Pansy said, drawing away. “How do you know, Granger, that _Harry_ and Draco aren’t going out?”

Hermione frowned thoughtfully. She looked at Harry, then back at Pansy. “Wait. Are they?”

Pansy sniggered, raising an eyebrow meaningfully.

“Stop it,” Harry commanded without much hope.

“Er,” Ron said, his red hair sticking up from where he had scrubbed his hands through it in alarm. “Are you?”

Pansy shrieked with laughter.

“We’re not,” Harry said with finality.

“You never know,” Pansy told him.

“Actually, I think I would, since I’d be involved.”

Pansy just kept on giggling, and Harry tried not to shift self-consciously. Luckily, Hermione came to his rescue: she started talking about Bulgaria and how she had never been, and Pansy, who apparently had, was distracted into listing her top five must-sees.

After a few minutes of listening to this, Ron took an audible breath and said to Harry, “I wanted to apologise. About — not being very nice.”

Hermione glanced their way, but did not stop her conversation with Pansy.

“That’s okay,” Harry replied. “It’s understandable.”

“No,” Ron said uncomfortably. “It was shitty of me.”

“Malfoy’s never said one decent thing about you,” Harry told him. “And I’m never going to leave him, so like I said: I get it. Don’t worry about it, Ron. I know you’re a good guy.”

“Er,” Ron said. “Leave him, like —“

“We’re friends,” Harry said quickly.

“Okay,” Ron said, equally quickly.

“It’s fine,” Harry reiterated. He added, “Er. I’d like to be friendly again, if you don’t mind, for next year. There’s … there’s going to be a lot happening, I think.”

Ron nodded. “I’d like that, too.”

“Great.” Harry smiled. He held out his fist. Ron knocked his against it. “To fifth year and beyond.”

“To fifth year and beyond,” Ron agreed, grinning.


	7. Chapter 7

Summer was agony; at night the nightmares would not leave him alone, and during the day he felt himself rotting, cut off from everything that mattered. Hermione sent him a few owls, but explained dishearteningly in them that there was nothing she could say in a letter. Draco, as he had warned, sent nothing at all. Whether he had managed to convince Lucius and Narcissa to go into hiding, whether he was safe at all, was unknowable. Everytime an owl did come Harry took it with dread, afraid that it would say — he didn’t even want to think it.

His inability to do magic was unbearable, too, to a higher degree than it ever had been before. Despite himself, he had grown used to Narcissa’s standing invitation to the Manor; with weeks of freedom spent with Draco to look forward to, the Dursleys had seemed almost inconsequential.

They weren’t inconsequential this time. He spent the entirety of July holding himself back from hexing Dudley’s face inside-out, and then when the Dementors came and it became clear that he was going to be brought before the Ministry for saving Dudley’s worthless soul, he thought vindictively that he shouldn’t have bothered with self-restraint after all.

The only good thing about the whole affair was being able to leave Privet Drive for Grimmauld Place.

There, at least, was Hermione, warm and real: she greeted him with a hug and another kiss on the cheek, which she had seemed to have decided was now appropriate between them.

“Harry,” she said, “how are you holding up?”

He shrugged. “Better, now. Have you…?”

She shook her head. “No, I haven’t heard a thing about Malfoy.”

Trying to hide his disappointment, he asked, “How was Bulgaria?”

A secretive smile grew on her face. “Oh, well, you know.”

Ron was there, too. They knocked shoulders amicably, and Harry inclined his head warily to the twins, who had half-descended the stairs to stare.

“Don’t mind them,” Ron said. “They know you’re not evil.”

“But do we, George?” one of them said cynically, and they went back up.

“Er,” Harry said, looking for a change of topic. He pointed at some velvet curtains along the wall. “What are these?”

“Don’t —“ Hermione exclaimed, but too late: Harry had drawn them open.

“Begone!” came the shrill scream. “Wretched scum, blight upon the world! The House of Black will devour your entrails for besmirching its —“

Squinting in the dim light, Harry read the plaque below the framed canvas. “Walburga Black? You’re Walburga Black? Draco’s great aunt?”

“Half-breeds!” cried the portrait, then stopped. Walburga Black wiped unbecomingly at the spittle on her chin and peered back at him. Threateningly, she asked, “Who are you?”

“Harry Potter,” Harry said, with a touch of uncertainty. “I’m in Slytherin, with Draco Malfoy. When were you painted? Do you remember Draco?”

“Harry Potter,” she repeated, and for a second he thought she was going to scream again, but she only narrowed her eyes and looked him up and down. “I see.”

Ron had an expression of pure shock on his face. Hermione, as if afraid to be seen, had moved behind him and had her hand to her mouth.

“Since, um, you’re here,” Harry said hesitantly, “does this mean — may I ask, is this the Black ancestral home?”

Fastidiously, Walburga rearranged her robes, which were in disarray, possibly from all the screaming. Instead of answering him directly, she replied, “It has been overrun with vermin. The House of Black has never seen darker days. And Orion and I were so sure …” Trailing off, she concentrated her gaze on him again. “Draco, you said? Cissy’s child?”

“Er, yes.”

“He’s your age?”

“Yes.”

“Where is he?”

Harry felt the carefully polite smile drop from his face. “I’m not sure. He’s probably at the Manor, with his parents.”

“I’d like to see him,” Walburga said, and for the first time her voice approached something that could be termed as gentle.

“So would I,” muttered Harry.

“He would set this house to rights,” Walburga continued, and again her tone was ugly.

“I don’t think the people here can leave, at least not for a while,” Harry told her. He glanced down the hallway and walked forward a little to look up the stairs. It was all very dreary and dank. “There’s a war going on. Do you know Voldemort?”

Ron twitched.

Walburga’s face changed; her wrinkles deepened, her eyes darkened. With grief, she said, “Regulus believed so completely in that Lord Voldemort,” and Harry remembered with a start that she was Sirius’ mother. “And then one day …” From the depths of her robes she drew forth a handkerchief, turning away.

He waited, but she did not turn back.

“C’mon,” Hermione whispered, and delicately drew the curtains forward again as Walburga’s oil-painted tears fell in complete silence.

“Merlin, Harry,” Ron said, as they walked up the steps to Harry’s assigned room, “I didn’t know that old bat was capable of normal speech.”

Harry was troubled. “I didn’t know she would be like that. I suppose maybe I should’ve.” He asked, “Is Sirius here? He is, isn’t he?”

Harry had not replied to Sirius’ last owl, which had come to him around Easter, just before Harry’s fight with Draco.

“He is,” Hermione answered. “He’s just in the meeting that’s on right now.”

“There seems to be a lot of stuff going on,” Harry noted. “But, um.” He didn’t know how to politely ask why the house appeared to be in such a rundown state. He gestured awkwardly at the cobwebs in the corner, the moth-eaten rug, the heavy layer of sticky dust on top of the railing, which had clean finger-shaped patches here and there. He also noticed the house-elf heads, but thought it better to not comment on those.

“Well,” Hermione said with a helpless shrug, “the house is huge. Really: it doesn’t seem like it at first, but if you take a walk through it you’ll keep on finding more and more rooms, even though it seems like logically there isn’t enough space. We think maybe the house is squishing them all up out of spite.”

“To be honest, mate, we’ve been preoccupied with making the bedrooms livable,” Ron added. He stopped in front of a blue-ish door with a decorative serpent’s doorknob. “Here’s yours.”

“We thought you’d prefer to have your own,” Hermione told him, as Ron opened the door: the room was large and high-ceilinged with three tall windows that looked out into a courtyard (which did not seem like it could be there, considering the orientation of the house from the street). The furniture was of a rich ebony, and when Harry stepped inside the slithering shape of a silver snake slid across the thick carpet, making him jump back in startlement.

“Like it?” Ron asked with a grin.

“Ron picked it out,” Hermione supplied.

“Thought it was, y’know.” Ron made a hissing noise, to clarify.

Harry stepped gingerly back in. The snake, which was just a pattern on the carpet and not a real snake, reappeared and circled around his shoes, then, seemingly satisfied, went to the foot of the king-sized bed and curled up there like a cat. “Yeah, I like it. Cheers, Ron.”

“Took us an entire day to get it cleaned up,” Ron said. “Now that you’re here, by the way, don’t think you’re exempt from getting your elbows dirty.”

They came into the room as well; Hermione pulled out a chair by the desk and sat down, sighing. “That’s pretty much all they have us doing.”

“Really? You can’t go to the meetings?”

“Fred and George want to develop these things they’re calling Extendable Ears,” Ron said, sitting on the bed with Harry. “To, you know, listen in. But they keep complaining about not having enough funding, or something. I have no idea.”

“What about your parents? They go to the meetings, don’t they?”

“Pfft. ‘Sif Mum and Dad will tell me anything.”

Harry reclined back against the bed. “Sounds stupid.”

“I know, right?”

“I’m sure you’ve heard _some_ things, though. Haven’t you?” Harry looked from one to the other.

Hermione chewed on her lips. “Well …”

“Go on then,” Harry encouraged eagerly. “I’m all ears, even if they’re not extendable.”

***

“I still can’t believe you’re in Slytherin,” said Sirius. “Wait till James hears about this.”

Harry had come down to the kitchen for a cup of tea. The Order of the Phoenix had dispersed earlier, and only Sirius had been in there, sitting despondently at the table with a mug of something that had long turned cold. He looked better than he had at the end of third year, which was not saying much.

He was also a lot surlier in real life than in his letters, which had wrongfooted Harry; he kept expecting stories of adventure and was met instead with doom and gloom.

Harry said carefully, “I saw Dad. Back in June. During the er, duel with Voldemort.”

“Priori Incantatem,” Sirius murmured. “Yes, I heard from Dumbledore. What did James say?”

The kettle whistled. Harry turned off the stove with his wand and said, carefully, “There wasn’t much time. He told me to — to live.”

He poured his cup of tea and sat down with it, fidgeting.

“Good advice,” Sirius said finally.

“I didn’t — I mean,” Harry mumbled, then spoke up louder. “The Sorting Hat, it offered me Gryffindor.”

“Why didn’t you go, then?” Sirius asked.

“Malfoy had just been sorted.” Harry took a sip. The cup was chipped, which was not a sight he was used to with wizarding china, where everything, unless enchanted, was fixed easily with a charm even first-years could manage. “So. I thought. The Hat said I’d do well in Slytherin.”

“Judging by your letters, your housemates seem to like you,” Sirius commented. “You talk about Draco Malfoy a lot.”

Harry took another sip. At least the tea leaves were rich with flavour.

“You’ve stayed at Malfoy Manor, haven’t you?” Sirius pressed. “How’s that?”

“Not this summer,” Harry told him, avoiding the question. He both wanted and did not want to talk about Draco; the memory of him was like a knife, dangerous and uncertain. “Wait, what did you say?”

Sirius frowned quizzically. “I said, how’s Draco Malfoy.”

“No, you said Malfoy Manor. Where is Malfoy Manor, Sirius?”

Sirius looked at him with concern. “In Wiltshire. Which you should know, if you’ve stayed there. Are you all right?”

“Malfoy Manor is in Wiltshire,” Harry said, and pictured easily in his head the wrought iron gates, the long path leading toward them. “Shit.”

“What is it?”

Harry stared at the tea, the chipped cup, the scratched wooden table. It was the beginning of August, and Draco had not managed to get the Manor under the protection of a Fidelius Charm.

***

Every morning he woke up and tried to say aloud: “Malfoy Manor is in Wiltshire.”

Every morning he said it without difficulty.

As Hermione and Ron had promised, they cleaned the house, but even the endless work could not distract him. The only thing that actually managed to do so was his Ministry hearing, and in the end that only added to his worries: Dumbledore had never been _quite_ so overt with his disappointment in Harry. What had he done wrong, this time? He’d saved Dudley, hadn’t he? Was he supposed to have done it some other way, that would not necessitate Dumbledore having to make a trip to the Ministry especially to prevent Harry from being expelled?

He didn’t know, and couldn’t find out, because none of the adults would tell him anything, not even Sirius.

And then on the last day of August he encountered the boggart.

He went into a room on the fourth floor, thinking to clean it, and there on the dusty grey floor was Draco, crumpled and lifeless.

Harry fumbled for the edge of the doorway, vision swimming with vertigo. His grip on his wand was suddenly sweaty. It wasn’t real, it wasn’t real.

It wasn’t real, but it looked real: it was exactly how he remembered it, what he had seen when he and Snape and Hermione had blown into the imposter Moody’s office, only this time Draco had no heartbeat, wasn’t breathing —

“_Riddikulus_,” he cast, frantic.

_Crack_. Draco got up, and looked at him like he was a stranger, like something inside was broken.

“No,” he whispered, and cast again.

_Crack_. Draco was dead once more, but this time it was a tableau from his imagination, a scene taken out of a particularly inventive nightmare.

Harry closed his eyes against the pooling blood. “_Riddikulus_.”

_Crack_. Draco stood up again, whole and unharmed, and, finally, he was sneering. He drawled: “Don’t be stupid, Potter; if I died you’d know, because I’d send you a Howler from beyond the grave.”

Harry laughed, more with relief than anything else, and the boggart dissipated into smoke.

He kept laughing, sliding down along the doorway onto the floor, and then suddenly he couldn’t laugh anymore.

Thankfully, there was no one around to see. He sucked in a harsh breath.

Tomorrow. The Hogwarts Express was tomorrow.

***

Draco was not on the Hogwarts Express.

“No, I didn’t get any more owls from him,” Pansy said.

Neither had any of the other Slytherins.

“It’ll be okay,” Hermione promised, sounding worried, when he went to her compartment to report back. She even partially got up from her seat with her hand outstretched, as if she thought he might lose his balance in the swaying rhythm of the train.

“Sure,” he agreed, and left again before he could worry her further.

During the Welcoming Feast he stared unseeingly at the doors to the Great Hall, not bothering even to look when the new Defence teacher got up to make some sort of speech.

Malfoy Manor was in Wiltshire.

Draco Malfoy was not at Hogwarts.

He wasn’t at Hogwarts, and he wasn’t at Hogwarts, and then suddenly he was. On Sunday morning Harry stood at the gargoyle to Dumbledore’s office with a list of sweets he recited until the gargoyle moved aside, and Draco was there standing by Dumbledore’s fireplace, turning at Harry’s entrance.

The shock was almost physical, like a punch. Instinctively, Harry got out his wand.

Draco looked perfectly normal. “Potter,” he said, nodding coolly.

Dumbledore, Harry noted, was sitting behind his desk. He appeared to be deeply engrossed in an examination of one of his many silver instruments, and did not seem disposed to even move his head in Harry’s general direction.

“Thank you, Professor,” Draco was saying now, “for the use of your phoenix.”

“You’re welcome, Mr Malfoy,” replied Dumbledore. “You’d better make sure your things are in order for class tomorrow.”

It was a clear dismissal. Draco inclined his head and shoved past Harry on his way out, since Harry was still standing there blocking the doorway.

Harry said, at a complete loss, “I was, er, coming to ask you about Malfoy. Never mind. Sorry to disturb you, Professor.”

Dumbledore said, still examining the instrument, “Not at all, Harry. You may go.”

Harry shot back out. Draco was waiting for him at the bottom of the spiralling staircase. Harry hurtled straight into him in his haste, nearly sending them both crashing to the floor.

“Ouch,” Draco complained. “Watch where you’re going, four-eyes.” He righted Harry’s glasses gently; then, with a hand on Harry’s neck, drew him into a hug.

“Fuck, Draco, I thought you were another boggart,” Harry said shakily into Draco’s collar.

“A boggart? Is that why you got your wand out?”

Harry stood back. He put away his wand. “Where’ve you been? It didn’t seem like the Manor —“

“Not here,” Draco interrupted, and grabbed his wrist.

They walked all the way over to a deserted alcove by the Astronomy Tower before Draco would talk. The first thing he said was: “You look like utter shit.”

“Shut up, Malfoy.”

“Father said you had a hearing at the Ministry.”

“Dumbledore took care of it. Lucius was at the Ministry?”

Draco grimaced. He put a finger to his lips.

“Oh,” Harry said. “Listen, about the Manor —“

“It was too difficult to Fidelius.”

“So…?”

Draco glanced around them. They were completely alone. He shuffled Harry back against the ledge, then moved even closer. Harry’s breath caught in his throat.

Draco whispered in his ear, barely audible: “Ursa-at-Sea is located on the White Cliffs of Dover, at the end of Arcturus Way.”

It was different to reading Dumbledore’s note about Grimmauld Place. Without being physically at the location, it felt merely like a gap in his mind he had not been aware of had been filled.

Draco was staring at him, as if to make sure Harry had heard it all properly. Harry nodded minutely.

Stepping back, Draco explained, “We’ve warded off the Manor as fully as possible, but it’s not ideal. The winged horses, for one. And the house-elves will not leave, of course. They’re terribly upset.”

“What about your parents?”

“It’s a Black house belonging to Mother; she suggested it. It was built by Arcturus Black the First. She said she always liked going there when she was young. She’s treating it like a holiday, I suppose.”

A war, like it was a holiday. Harry wasn’t going to comment.

Instead, he said, “But not Lucius.”

“He won’t _listen_,” Draco hissed with frustration. “Not properly.”

“Is he…?”

“He won’t say.” There was no glass on the window; Draco slung a leg over the ledge and glared at the tranquil view of the Forbidden Forest below. Harry sat down opposite him.

After a while, Draco blinked out of his thoughts and said, “Also: I got made Prefect.”

“Yeah, Hermione told me after she saw the roster list.”

“Jealous? Now you really have to do what I say, Potter.”

“You and Pansy.”

Draco smiled faintly. “I’m glad it’s Pansy.”

“Why were you late coming back?”

Draco looked down the hallway with paranoia again. “I kept feeling like I was being watched, whenever I was outside the bounds of Fidelius. I didn’t want Mother to apparate me, and we couldn’t connect the Floo. And Father …” He shook his head. “I know that you talked to Dumbledore about me in July, by the way.”

“Yeah, well,” Harry said. “I don’t see you complaining about your access to phoenix travel. You should be thanking me.”

Snorting, Draco warned, “You know Dumbledore doesn’t run a charity.”

“I don’t care,” Harry replied. “Whatever the price, I’ll pay it.”


	8. Chapter 8

“Psst, Harry,” Pansy hissed, and surreptitiously passed him a note.

It was folded up into a neat pentagon; Draco’s name was written on it in a lovely cursive script.

Harry poked Draco’s arm with it to get his attention. Draco raised questioning eyebrows; Harry made an exaggerated face of ridicule back.

Glancing quickly at the front of the classroom, Draco tapped at the note with his wand to get it to unfold. It took about a minute, and separated into four sheets of parchment, upon which Harry could glimpse the same cursive, spaced out elegantly.

He leaned in closer, curious. Draco looked at him askance and made a half-hearted elbowing motion, which made Harry smirk and push back.

“_Hem, hem_,” came Umbridge’s disapproving cough. “Mr Malfoy, Mr Potter. Have you finished reading chapter one?”

“It’s Potter’s fault, Professor,” whined Draco. “He craves attention, you see.”

In front of them, Blaise laughed into his hand.

Harry directed a look of outrage at Draco and shoved him again in the shoulder.

“Yes, I do see,” Umbridge said sweetly. “Dear me, Mr Potter! It’s time to grow up a little, and learn what is appropriate behaviour for a place of education.”

“I couldn’t have said it better myself, Professor.” The way Draco could make his voice sparkle horribly with innocence was truly astounding.

“Malfoy, you prick,” Harry said under his breath.

“_Hem hem_, Mr Potter,” admonished Umbridge. “Language!”

Draco said placatingly, “Don’t worry, Professor. I’ll do my best to keep him out of trouble.”

“Thank you, Mr Malfoy, for your assistance.” Umbridge clapped her hands and beamed at them. “Back to reading, please!”

Draco waited for her to turn away, then brought the note — or letter, rather — back up from his lap. Once again, Harry tried to read it. Draco sighed (very quietly, but nevertheless with a great deal of emphasis) and let him.

_Dear Draco Malfoy_, Harry read, _I hope that you had a good summer. The weather was wonderfully warm at the Jade Hall, and I passed many languid days in the sunshine, splitting my time between boating and painting. My mother tells me that your mother is a great patron of the arts. Do you share her interests in this area, or do you find passion elsewhere? If you will forgive my boldness, I would very much like to —_

It was a love letter. A _love letter_.

Draco was perusing it very solemnly, without one hint of a sneer.

Mutely, Harry went back to _Defensive Magical Theory_ by Wilbert Slinkhard.

***

“That woman is driving me mad!” Hermione declared. Despite her obvious agitation, she placed her bag down on the library table gently: it was full of books, and Hermione Granger did not mistreat books.

“Umbridge?” Harry guessed.

“Yes, Umbridge, Harry! God, how do you stand it?”

If Harry were to be completely honest, since not-Moody had turned out to be an actual Death Eater who had tortured Draco into unconsciousness to send a message, Harry’s standards for Defence professors had dropped significantly, and they had already been rather low, considering Lockhart. He shrugged. “The lesson was pretty boring, yeah.” The point was, at least no one was getting _Crucio_‘ed.

“But don’t you think,” Hermione argued, the old glint of Righteousness and Justice in her eye, “that it’s extremely, extremely important that we learn proper, real, practical defence this year? Considering our circumstances?”

“When you put it that way.”

“She threatened me with detention!” Hermione went on indignantly. “Just because I asked some questions and then pointed out that since You-Know-Who is back we needed to be on our best guard.”

“Why don’t you just teach yourself?” Harry suggested absently, thumbing through his books, trying to find the correct date for the second giant war between the Golgurth and Uldesud clans.

Hermione gasped with revelation. She put a hand on his, tapping at his knuckles excitedly. “That’s it! You’re a genius!”

It felt pretty nice to be called a genius by the smartest and most hard-working witch he knew. But Hermione’s next words popped the pleasant bubble of celebration and filled him instead with dread:

“You should teach us! You know heaps of stuff, Harry, not to mention have real experience.”

“Hahaha,” Harry said nervously. “You mean, what? Run a sort of vigilante group?”

“Why not?” Hermione challenged. “The Ministry is sticking its head in the sand, so obviously we need to take action.”

“Most of the school thinks I’m making things up for attention. Or that I’m the Heir of Slytherin, and I’m making my move after biding my time since second year. Or that I’m in on it with Voldemort and all of this is some crazy orchestrated plot. Or some mixture of the three.” It was very useful, he reflected, to have Pansy give him bulletins about gossip at breakfast. It made her happy, and it saved him work.

“Some people believe you,” Hermione insisted unhappily.

“Yeah,” Harry agreed. “Like the Slytherins, who would be stupid not to, since some of their relatives were there. Or the Weasleys, or — Tonks, or you, who all also have insider knowledge.”

Contemplatively, Hermione said, “That’s true. It’s all just a bunch of rumours, isn’t it?”

While her enormous brain was partially occupied, Harry took his chance. “You should teach the class.”

“What?” Hermione shot him a startled look.

“The vigilante whatever. You should do it. You helped me with all those spells before the Third Task. You’re completely capable.”

“But I’m not experienced!”

“You’re more experienced than the people you’ll be teaching. Probably. Um. Definitely.”

Hermione gave him a pleading look. “You think it’d work?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll come too?”

“Er …”

“You can bring your Slytherins.”

Harry considered. “If they’re interested. Okay.”

Hermione bit her lip. “Do you really think it would work?”

Having learnt a thing or two from Blaise, Harry winked at her with as much mischief as he could manage. “Give it a go, Professor Granger. Do you know when the second Golgurth-Uldesud war was, by the way?”

Of course she knew it down to the day.

***

On Friday, Harry’s scar hurt and he was overwhelmed with a flash of feeling that did not belong to him.

Later that same night, Draco had a nightmare.

He didn’t scream or otherwise make any sort of verbal sound. Harry only noticed at all because he himself had had trouble sleeping, unable to throw off the blanket of anxiety that the scar had wrapped him under.

It began with a noise that sounded like someone turning over in their sheets, which was entirely normal. Except it happened again, and then again, and then again. There was no rhythm to it; if there had been, and if it had been quieter, it might almost have been — suggestive. Harry wasn’t going to judge. It was a dorm full of teenage boys; it happened. But the impression of real violent movement dispersed any possibility of it being merely a private moment.

It didn’t last for very long. Even as Harry levered himself up on an elbow and pulled back the curtains of his bed, squinting uselessly in the dark without his glasses, there was a final thump followed by a disquieting silence.

Harry got up and padded over to Draco’s bed. He drew back the curtain.

He couldn’t really see, but after a moment he had the impression of a figure curled in the tangle of blankets, breathing harshly, a hand over the mouth.

Unsure, but determined, Harry lowered his hand until it met a — shoulder, he ascertained, and then brought it up to the back of Draco’s neck, which was clammy and cold with sweat. Draco shuddered.

“Hey,” Harry whispered, just a puff of air. He got a knee up onto the bed; Draco was balled up almost in the centre, the pillows in disarray. “It’s me.”

He sat down at the head of the bed, leaning back against the wood, his legs crossed. Tugged gently on Draco’s hair.

Over the course of several minutes, Draco’s body unspun itself from its knot of fear. With another quavering breath he pushed himself up the mattress and pressed his face into the side of Harry’s hip. Harry kept his hand loosely on Draco’s neck.

Neither of them said anything. It didn’t take long for Harry to realise that Draco was again in the process of falling asleep, despite his still awkward position. Insofar as Harry was aware, Draco Malfoy, a spoilt only child of incredibly wealthy parents, had grown up sleeping on beds the size of small countries and thus had naturally developed an unattractive (but hilarious) sprawled out sleeping posture reminiscent of an overgrown four-legged crab. It was Harry who tucked in on himself, instinctively taking as little space as possible.

Draco wasn’t sprawled out now — he was half on his side, one arm bent and pinned in a way that Harry was sure was uncomfortable. His nose dug into Harry’s thigh.

But the rise and fall of his chest was becoming steady. He didn’t turn away.

Harry sat there, not quite able to fall asleep himself, instead drifting in and out of wakefulness, until he realised that it was light enough that he could see: the ugly twist of the sheets, and the pale arch of Draco’s foot caught within them.

Carefully, he slid off the side of the bed and went back to his own.

***

He didn’t wake up until very late in the morning. The dormitory was empty, save for Draco, who was sitting on the window sill, watching the fish and already composing his usual monthly letter to Narcissa, even though he had not yet been at Hogwarts for a even a full week.

“Your scar is worrying me,” he said by way of greeting, as Harry rummaged sleepily in his trunk.

Harry went to brush his teeth. When he came back, he asked, “Are we going to talk about it?”

“We’re certainly talking about your scar,” Draco said.

“The other thing,” Harry clarified.

Draco wrinkled his nose. “I guess, if we must.”

Sitting down as well, Harry said, “Is it bad?”

“Define bad,” Draco answered cynically. He eased the window open slightly, dipped his hand out, then brought it back in and flicked some lake water at Harry. “It’s a predictable side effect.”

“Is it,” Harry tried again, “painful?”

A sneer.

“How often?”

“Less and less,” said Draco. “I don’t know.”

“Do your parents know?”

“Mother wanted to take me to a Healer, or better, hire one to make regular calls in private,” Draco admitted. “Considering the situation, though, we agreed that it wasn’t the most paramount of issues.”

The way he said ‘we agreed’ suggested strongly that there had been significant amounts of persuasion involved.

“Can a Healer fix it?” Harry asked.

Draco put his letter aside. “They could Obliviate it, which sometimes helps. But then they’d have to get rid of that entire evening, and anyway I’d rather remember. The best method would be to store it in a Pensieve and break the direct mental links, but another side effect of Cruciatus, as it turns out, is that it fragments your mind enough so that memories are difficult to retrieve comprehensively.” He brought both socked feet up onto the sill and leaned his elbow on his knees. “The other thing, of course, is that Healers can give you calming draughts and discuss your trauma with you.” He sneered again.

Harry understood: what was there to discuss? It hurt unimaginably; it was pure physical agony; it was impossible to describe meaningfully to someone who had not experienced it. There was nothing to discuss. You either had suffered it, or you had not.

Harry had suffered it.

He said, fumbling for the words, “I might not always realise — when. When you’re, you know. Does it always wake you up? You should wake me up, when it does.”

He was ready for Draco to make all sorts of vehement nonsense rationalisations about how Harry was crazy for offering. But though there was a significant pause, Draco responded only with, “If you fail all your OWLs, Potter, don’t use an interrupted sleep cycle as an excuse. Remember, those Trolls were yours to begin with.”

“I’ll show you trolls,” Harry muttered.

Draco perked up. “My turn. Let’s talk about that lightning bolt, scarhead.”

***

The gargoyle’s password was still ‘Ice Mice’.

“Harry,” said Dumbledore, not looking at him, “and Draco.”

Draco had marched into the office and sat down on one of the seats as if he had had an appointment, or as if, perhaps more accurately, everyone else in the room had been waiting on his leisure. Although some of his dramatic presentation had been marred because he had been required to drag Harry in by the sleeve, it had certainly still displeased the portraits of previous headmasters and mistresses sitting along the wall. Several of them made faint tittering noises and leaned past their own frames into those of their neighbours to make low comments in painted ears.

Now, legs crossed, robes perfectly in order, Draco looked like he was enjoying himself. Harry wasn’t; he tapped his hand against the armrest impatiently. Draco glared at him. Harry tapped harder, one two three, then, imitating Pansy, sniffed.

“Professor,” Draco said.

“Sherbet lemon?” offered Dumbledore.

“No, thank you.”

“Usually,” Dumbledore said, “it is sufficient for prefects to make their reports to the Head Boy and Girl, who will then deliver a summary to me, or the Deputy Headmistress.”

“Thank you, I’m aware.” Draco smiled politely. For a moment he looked and sounded like Lucius, but then he ruined the image by saying, “It’s about Potter. His scar is bothering him.”

“How so?”

Draco described every incident in order, since Quirrell.

Dumbledore suggested, “Perhaps you should take him to the hospital wing.”

Draco said with a touch of impatience, “Let’s not bother playing games, Professor. I’m not one of your Gryffindors. Do you remember my owl from the summer?”

“I’ve been aware of the issues with Harry’s scar.”

“Then why haven’t you done anything about it?”

“What would you have me do, Mr Malfoy?”

“It’s obviously a connection to the Dark Lord,” Draco stated flatly. “I’d expect you to use it. Is that what you’re doing?”

“It’s a curse scar, yes,” Dumbledore said, failing to elaborate any further, or to answer the question.

“It’s a curse scar that’s giving him emotions that don’t belong to him,” Draco snapped. “Last year he was getting visions. If you’re using it as a tactical weapon then I think he deserves to be informed officially, but otherwise I want you to fix it.” He added belatedly: “Sir.”

Harry didn’t like the way Dumbledore was looking at Draco. It was a look of kingly benevolence transforming into judgement, the face of someone who held all the power in a conversation, who knew that every final decision was theirs to make or unmake.

Dumbledore said: “There is a method we could try.”

***

“Thanks,” Harry said sarcastically, “for signing me up for extra-curricular classes with a slimeball.”

“Don’t disrespect our esteemed Head of House,” Draco admonished sternly.

Harry groaned into his hands. “There’s too much to _do_, Draco, I don’t have enough _time_. There’s — Quidditch practice, for one; Montague has a new schedule to make up for last year, he says, it’s going to be bloody murder, and I have about ten million essays due, and —“

“Quit grousing,” Draco cut in unsympathetically. “You’ll get through it all like you usually do; that is to say, like an offended hippogriff in a room full of delicate family heirlooms: catastrophically.”

“Thanks,” Harry said again. “I don’t think it’s quite that bad.”

“Exactly, Potter. Have faith. Anyway, Occlumency is high level magic. It’ll be extremely useful. You wouldn’t normally have a chance like this.”

Harry had his doubts about what an immense privilege it was, but Draco did not; to prove this he had insisted that _he_ be allowed to take the lessons, too, and then apparently since Snape considered Draco Malfoy a plus, and Harry Potter a minus, he had agreed in order to neutralise his equation, or something.

Despite this, Snape still seemed rather joyless about it all.

“You need to clear your mind, Potter,” he sniped at Harry during their very first lesson in early October. “That shouldn’t be difficult, considering it’s empty to begin with.”

“I don’t know how,” Harry said, rubbing his temples. “You keep telling me to do it, but you won’t tell me _how_.”

“Let go of all emotion,” Snape repeated; it had not been helpful the first time and was still not helpful the fifteenth time. “Apply yourself. Concentrate.”

Draco, who apparently had a knack for it, added, “Detach.”

“How am I supposed to do that?” Harry asked, frustrated, later that night when they were sitting alone in the common room after Draco had returned from his prefect duties.

“It’s like when you end the day and put away what’s happened,” Draco explained. In his hands he was playing with a strange wooden cube carved through with formulae that he used for Arithmancy; he rolled it across the table. It landed, impossibly, on one of its corners. With a sort of _thrum_ it shivered still and stood there flawlessly balanced.

“Put away what?”

“You know, Potter. You think about the events that transpired that day and then you put them away, so that you can sleep.”

Harry most certainly did not know. “You do that?”

Draco looked surprised. “You don’t?”

“Er, no.”

“Oh.” Draco thought for a moment. “It’s like … like turning a page in a book. You remember what you read, but once you turn the page you move on to the next one. You don’t tempt yourself to go back and reread it. And the next page has nothing on it, so it’s quiet and you can fall asleep.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Harry said. “You mean that thing Snape said about making my mind blank and empty before sleep — you’ve already been doing it?”

“I suppose. It sounds very similar.”

It sounded exactly the same. “Is this some secret technique your parents taught you?”

“What? No, of course not.”

Harry let out a breath. “How do you do it, then?”

“I just told you,” Draco said, frowning. Then, noting the glumness on Harry’s face, he added, “All right. Think of what you ate for lunch today.”

“Okay,” Harry said slowly, forming a mental image of his steak pie.

“Now stop thinking about it,” Draco commanded.

“Er. Okay.” It had been delicious, even if he had had to eat quickly thanks to his full schedule.

“Are you still thinking about it?”

“Er. No?”

Draco made a disbelieving sound. “Try this — take the memory apart. Not like it’s a puzzle. Don’t try and separate the sight and the taste or whatever. I mean the fact of its happening, the emotions that it elicits, the thoughts you associate with it. Now put them into different parts of your mind, and shut the lid.”

“You do this every night?” It sounded awfully complicated.

“It’s easy once you’re used to it. Though,” Draco said, lowering his voice, “the more emotional or powerful a memory is, the harder it is to put away.”

Harry thought of Draco’s nightmare. “Right.” He stared hard at the arithmancy cube and tried to do as Draco had explained: the pie, the satisfaction from eating it, the thoughts of the classes that had both preceded and followed lunch. They were three different things, he told himself unconvincingly.

When he looked up again, Draco was facing the windows, which held a partial reflection of them broken by the grilles.

“Well?” Draco prompted.

“Er,” Harry said. “I don’t know if I did it right.”

Draco half-smiled; his reflection, muted by the black lake, smiled distantly back. “Do it again before you sleep.”

Harry put a finger on the cube and knocked it over onto its side. “I’ll try.”

***

The next day, Hermione issued him an invitation to the first ever meeting of her vigilante group in Hogsmeade that weekend.

“Granger’s what?” Pansy asked. “How long is this going to take, exactly?”

“Can’t,” said Vincent. “Got detention.”

“If Malfoy’s going,” said Greg, who still sometimes acted like he had at eleven, when he and Vincent had followed Draco around everywhere.

“I’m busy,” Theo told him mysteriously.

“Is that why Padma …” Blaise began, and trailed off. “Will she be there?”

“Um,” Harry said. “I don’t know.”

“Best not,” Blaise decided, posing his head so that the sun fell dramatically across his cheekbones. “I have an image to maintain.”

“If Pans is going,” said Millie, “she’ll tell us about it later.” Daphne and Tracey agreed.

So it was that on Saturday Harry entered the Hog’s Head with Draco, Pansy and Greg in tow. Hermione was already there, along with several other students in varying houses and years (including Padma and her sister). She beamed at Harry as soon as she saw him. There was a nervous jitter to her wave; the crowd she had gathered was not insignificant in size.

Some raised eyebrows were visible as they pulled up extra chairs, but no one said anything until the Weasley twins showed up with their friend (the one who did all the Quidditch commentary and who, Draco liked to complain, was hideously biased).

“Oops,” one of the twins said to Hermione, “I think you’ve accidentally given the enemy our coordinates.”

“We can help,” said the other, rummaging around in his Zonko’s bag. “Here —“

“No, George,” Hermione interrupted hurriedly. “Look, I told Harry he could bring his friends. Anyway, you guys are the last ones, so I think we can get started? Will you sit?”

“I’ll get the drinks,” replied — Fred, apparently. His friend went with him to the bar.

“Who’s the enemy?” asked Greg in a whisper, as George Weasley sat down. “He talking about us?”

“Yes,” Draco said, sounding bored.

“Don’t drink what they give us,” Harry suggested in a low voice, nodding hello to Ron at the other end of the table.

“I wasn’t born yesterday, Potter.”

“I was talking to Greg.”

“He wasn’t, either. Relax.”

It was extremely difficult to follow Draco’s advice with most of the gathered people casting sceptical or outright hostile glances his way. Hermione, nervous to begin with, didn’t get very far in her introduction before that Hufflepuff, Smith, cut her off by saying:

“It’s _defence_ you want to teach, right? Just to be clear.”

“That’s correct,” Hermione replied. “So —“

“Only it seemed for a moment maybe we’re here to just learn the Dark Arts.”

Some people laughed.

“Afraid the lessons will be too complex for you?” Draco asked snidely.

Under the table, Harry kicked him lightly.

“No,” Smith replied aggressively. “I’m just wondering if this is all a big joke. I mean, we’ve all heard the rumours, and if I believed them —“

“Which rumours are those?” Pansy interjected.

Hermione said quickly, “The ones about You-Know-Who being back.”

“If I believed them,” Smith went on, just as though there had been no interruption, “I’d think that learning _defence_ with a bunch of snakes seems to defeat the purpose.”

“Hear hear,” said the twins.

“Shut up, Fred, George,” said Ron.

“Come and make us, ickle Ronniekins.”

“Harry’s fought You-Know-Who,” Hermione said.

“When he was a baby, you mean,” Smith said.

“More than once,” Hermione insisted.

“Where’s the proof?”

Hermione looked at Harry. Harry said, “I don’t have to prove anything to you, Smith.”

“Then I don’t see why —“

“Then _leave_,” Draco cut in waspishly. “Stop wasting everyone’s time.”

“Right,” Hermione said anxiously. “So. To be clear, there won’t be any interrogation of Harry. The point of this group is to learn together, so that we can — we can be ready when we need to be. Whether you believe what you’ve heard or not. Can we agree on that?”

There were some mutters, but they were accompanied by nods. Hermione moved on to the rest of her agenda (she had it all written down on a Muggle notebook, Harry could see), and they had gotten through an outline of topics they would be covering and argued fruitlessly about the meeting time when she brought up the contract.

“No, Granger,” said Pansy straight away. “Putting my name on an incriminating list that could be used for blackmail? That’s stupid.”

The twins were already signing their names. The one on the right, George, said, “Of course you’d say that, if you’re a snake.”

“She’s right,” Draco said to Harry. “I’m not signing it.”

“I’ll sign it,” Harry offered to Hermione.

“No you won’t,” said Draco with certainty.

“Well, I’m not a snake,” said Smith, and he put his name down. At this, the rest of the gathering seemed unable to voice any further qualms and all followed suit.

All except the four of them. Harry tried to take the parchment, but Draco got in the way.

“For god’s sake, Malfoy,” Harry said impatiently. “Hermione’s not going to blackmail us.”

“How informative,” commented Smith. “Now we see: who can be trusted and who cannot.”

Hermione looked upset. “I can’t let any of you come to the meetings if you don’t sign the parchment, Harry. It wouldn’t be fair.”

“She’s right, mate,” Ron said, grimacing apologetically.

“I don’t mind,” said a wispy-looking Ravenclaw girl. Harry glanced at her, startled, but everyone else ignored her.

Pansy crossed her arms.

“Can’t I sign for all of them?” Harry asked. “I trust them.”

Shaking her head, Hermione replied, “That’s not how it works.”

“Then I suppose we can’t come to the meetings,” Pansy concluded.

Harry studied them: Greg didn’t look like he cared much, but Draco and Pansy would not change their minds. And they had a point — even he could see that the list of names (which, knowing Hermione, was probably enchanted in some way) was not the most comforting thing in the world.

He didn’t want to be the only Slytherin; he didn’t think he would have the energy.

He said despondently, “Sorry, Hermione. I guess we can’t.”

The twins whispered something to each other. Smith turned to his Hufflepuff friend and sneered. Ron looked immensely disappointed.

“But,” Hermione said. “Oh, Harry.”

“I’m sorry,” he said again.

There wasn’t anything to be done: they had to get up and leave, their Butterbeers untouched. Harry felt the unsettling press of two dozen judgemental eyeballs on their backs before they finally stepped back out onto the street.

“Granger was right,” Pansy declared unexpectedly, once they had relocated to the Three Broomsticks. “We won’t learn anything much under Umbridge.”

“I didn’t know you wanted an OWL in Defence,” Draco said.

“Don’t be rude, Draco. I care about my marks.”

Draco raised an incredulous brow.

“I don’t like that the rest of our year will be getting extra help,” Pansy continued, swatting at him. “How’s that going to look, when the OWL results come out?”

“Then we should’ve signed the thing,” Greg said.

“No, we shouldn’t have,” Draco told him imperiously.

Greg shrugged. “Just saying, is all.”

Pansy traced a fingertip along the rim of her glass thoughtfully. “Aren’t you good at Defence, Harry? Why don’t you tutor us?” She swished her hand in the air. “Didn’t you learn how to cast a Patronus in third year?”

Harry blinked at her. “Er, well. Yeah.”

Snapping her fingers, Pansy said, “Then I want to learn that. I bet you already taught Draco.”

“Actually,” Harry said, with a wincing glance at Draco. “Um. I showed it to him, but he didn’t quite manage it.”

Pansy looked delighted by this news. “Really? Oh, then I definitely want to learn it.”

“We’ll all learn it,” Draco said firmly.

“Sounds fun,” agreed Greg.

“Excuse me,” Harry said, alarmed, “but this seems to be proceeding as though I already said yes. I haven’t.”

“Don’t be such a bore,” Pansy returned in that way she had when she talked to him, where her expression was oddly kind but her words were clinically straightforward. “Don’t you want to show those Gryffindors? Granger may be a walking encyclopaedia, Harry, but you’ve done stuff. Come on. Teach us.”

Harry could not recall Pansy ever showing this much enthusiasm for education before.

“It’s called an exchange of knowledge, Potter,” Draco drawled. “So far it’s been rather one-sided on my part, I’ll have you know.” He began to tick off subjects on his fingers: “Potions, Ancient Runes, Astronomy …”

“Fine,” Harry relented, taking a long drink of his Butterbeer. “Fine. How’re we going to do this?”


	9. Chapter 9

Draco started going out with Astoria Greengrass.

She was Daphne’s younger sister, so Harry had some passing knowledge of her existence, but other than noting her face in the common room and exchanging a rare greeting at the Slytherin table during mealtimes, he had never spoken to her. Whereas Daphne was blonde and sometimes quite loudly blunt, Astoria was a brunette with a soft voice and a timid presence.

She’d been the author of the four-page love letter.

Uncharacteristically, Draco did not make any sort of fanfare about his new relationship. Between his demanding Prefect duties, Harry’s Quidditch practice, their slightly differing schedules, and Harry’s occasional afternoons in the library with Hermione, it was not unusual for them to go much of the day without seeing each other except in shared classes, and so if it had not been for the so-called Slytherin ‘study group’ Pansy had took it upon herself to form, Harry might not have found out about Astoria at all.

As it was, after Umbridge passed Educational Decree Number Twenty-four, Harry had thought (with guilty relief) that their little group was not going forward, but he had of course been naive to think that Pansy would care very much about small obstacles like rules if they didn’t suit her cause (in this they were all shockingly similar).

She deposited herself theatrically onto the sofa by the common room fire that afternoon and announced, “Umbridge called us into her office.”

“Why?” Harry asked, looking up from his Herbology homework in alarm.

“To ask about Granger’s — what did you call it — vigilante group,” Pansy answered, smirking. “She didn’t say as much, but what else could it have been? Someone was in that pub, watching the whole meeting. She seemed to think I’d have something to say about it.”

“And, er, did you?”

Pansy flicked him lightly on the shoulder. “Of course not. My evil Slytherin heart was very tempted, though. You owe me, Harry.”

“I’ll buy you — um. What was it, that thing you were looking at in the magazine the other day?” He still had his winnings from the Triwizard Tournament lying around somewhere.

“Merlin, save me. You’d probably get it in the wrong colour. No: I’d rather you taught me how to cast a Patronus.”

“Oh,” Harry said.

Pansy locked him in with a steely gaze. “We’re still doing it. I’ve passed the word. Do you have a place we can use?”

Harry thought wildly. “How about our dormitory? We could Banish the beds against the walls.”

Pansy wrinkled her nose. “And then put them all back in their proper places? Sounds like a lot of work, and I’d rather not spend hours smelling … things.”

Harry didn’t bother interrogating her on what exact things she was referring to. “Fine,” he told her. “I’ll figure something out.”

He went and asked Hermione.

“Harry,” she said, distressed. “I can’t tell you where we’re holding our meetings if you’re not a part of the group, especially if Umbridge is trying to recruit the Slytherins!”

“But it’s not like I need to know _when_ you’re doing it,” Harry argued. “You mentioned earlier you have a really good place. How about this? I’ll let you know exactly when _we’ll_ use it, and then there won’t be any danger of us stumbling on your meetings by accident.”

She sighed heavily, then yielded. “All right, but you have to be careful with this information, okay? I heard it from Dobby, and it’s kind of weird, but listen.”

And so Harry learnt about the Room of Requirement.

He wanted to set up their first ‘study session’ on Saturday morning. It didn’t interfere with Occlumency, Quidditch, or Slytherin Prefect patrols.

It interfered with Draco’s date.

“What date?” Harry asked.

“With my girlfriend,” Draco clarified, as if he thought Harry had known. “Speaking of which, do you mind if I borrow your Firebolt?”

“Sure, take it,” Harry said. “Your girlfriend?”

“Astoria.”

“Astoria?”

“Yes,” Draco said slowly, frowning.

“You’re going out with her. On a date.”

“Yes, Potter. On a date.”

“Astoria. Your girlfriend Astoria. Astoria Greengrass?”

“Did someone break a Time Turner in here?” Draco asked.

“How come I didn’t know about this?” Harry demanded.

Draco gave him a strange look. “Pansy knows about it.”

“Pansy didn’t tell me!”

“Pansy tells everyone everything. That’s how Pansy works. What do you mean, she didn’t tell you?”

“I mean she didn’t tell me,” Harry said blankly.

“Well, whatever,” Draco said, waving a hand and brushing the topic aside, even though Harry could not seem to unstick the revelation of ‘Draco has a girlfriend’ from his immediate thoughts. “Now you know. Can we try Sunday morning instead?”

Harry shook his head. “Quidditch practice. How about half past noon? I’ll tell everyone to eat an early lunch.”

“Sure.”

It wasn’t until later on Sunday when Harry was in the sky dodging Bludgers as Montague yelled instructions that it occurred to him that he should have asked why Draco himself had not told him. After Harry had cornered Pansy, she had revealed the origin of the letter, as well as the fact that Draco had asked Astoria out a week later. That was an entire month ago. Harry should have been indignant that he had been kept in the dark for an entire _month_, but instead he just felt sort of … numb.

No one else seemed particularly shocked or even interested; Astoria was a Greengrass, a respectable match for a Malfoy, and that was all there was to it. It was what one did at school: learn magic, acquire OWLs and NEWTs, court prospective future partners. Harry’s parents had met at Hogwarts, too.

Astoria was a opportunistic trollop, he thought uncharitably in conclusion, and then Draco brought her to the large comfortable space the Room of Requirement had created for them, and Harry had to delete the thought in haste lest it show on his face when he greeted her.

“Ria,” said Daphne with a smile when they arrived.

“She was interested,” Draco explained to Harry.

“I see,” Harry said.

“I can watch from the sidelines,” Astoria said politely, “if it’s too much trouble. Only, Draco told me about your ability to cast a Patronus.”

“No reason you can’t try it with the rest of us,” Harry told her briskly, and felt horribly uncomfortable when she grinned shyly. “I don’t think we’ll start with the Patronus Charm, though. I’d rather go over some fundamentals first, to see where we’re all at.”

They were all fifth-years, apart from Astoria, but it was easy to see after one session of Disarming only that they had widely disparate skill levels. Pansy knew what she was doing but her casting was inconsistent from one iteration to the next; Greg had incredibly poor aim with a moving target; Vincent sometimes fumbled the wand movement; Theo could cast perfectly but was not very fast on the draw; Millie got over-excited and either fired too early or did not enunciate correctly; Tracey was prone to adding too many unnecessary flourishes and giving her opponent openings. And Daphne and Blaise, whom he had paired together, kept flirting instead of fighting (this, he suspected, was mostly Blaise’s fault).

Astoria actually did pretty well, on the whole. She had good form and obvious sincerity — she had not come with Draco to be cute or hang over his arm. When Draco let her, she could disarm him cleanly without trouble.

When he let her, that is.

“All right, Malfoy,” Harry said after watching a few minutes of this. “Give her a break. Let’s duel. No spells barred.”

They crossed the floor and bowed. Draco was already moving as he came up, firing off an _Aqua Eructo_. Harry, wise to his cheating ways, cast _Ascendio_ on himself and flew up out of the way of the water, flinging _Immobulus_ in Draco’s direction as he rose.

“_Incendio_,” Draco said, and Harry thought he’d missed until he realised that Draco had set the patch of floor Harry was about to land on on fire.

Harry rolled, turning clumsily when he righted himself to check that his robes weren’t aflame, and Draco took the opportunity of his distraction to disappear.

Everyone else had taken a step back towards the walls to watch, even though Harry hadn’t asked them to stop. When had Draco learnt the Disillusionment Charm?

“_Reducto_,” came Draco’s voice from the right, and Harry only barely managed to get a shield up in time. The curse rebounded and smashed into the Room’s ceiling, which, thankfully, absorbed it.

“_Serpensortia_,” Harry hissed, and when the python appeared said to it, “_Find the invisible boy and hold him without harming him_.” He had to block another hex from Draco mid-command.

The snake’s tongue flicked out, once, twice, and then it slithered with frightening speed towards a patch of air that was breathing.

“_Evanesco_,” Draco cast, but the Vanishing Spell was a new and difficult one they were only just learning, and it didn’t take.

Draco, remaining calm, began to cast a Reduction Charm instead, but Harry shot an _Expelliarmus_ in his general direction, and though it did not connect, it distracted him enough that the python could wind itself up his legs and send him falling.

“Ouch,” came the sharp protest. “Get it off me, Potter.”

Harry stood over him. “Release your Disillusionment and admit defeat.”

Draco shimmered back into being, making a face. “Get it off me first.”

“_It’s fine, you can let go_,” Harry said to the python.

“_It’sss cold in here_,” it complained plaintively.

“Oh.” Harry looked around the room. He bent down and held out his hand. “_Come up on me; I’ll take you outside so you can sun yourself_.”

“_Thanksss_.”

“_Expelliarmus_,” Draco said, having gotten himself upright.

Harry’s wand flew out of his hand. Smirking, Draco caught it neatly, and gave another bow to their audience. Pansy, Blaise and Astoria clapped, laughing.

“Yeah, yeah, Malfoy,” Harry said, rolling his eyes. “Congratulations.”

“You said nothing barred,” Draco told him.

“No _spells_ barred,” Harry corrected.

“You really are a Parselmouth,” Astoria said, coming up to them and looking at the python around Harry’s shoulders with her eyes wide.

“Er, yeah.” She looked enraptured, so he asked, “Do you want to touch it?”

Draco said jokingly, “Sure, Potter, ask my girlfriend if she wants to touch your snake.”

Harry felt himself turn red. Blaise and Daphne, overhearing, snickered into each other’s shoulders.

“Okay,” Harry said loudly to the room at large, ignoring them. “I think we’ll end it here for now and continue next Sunday, same time. It’s, um, cold in here and I told the snake I’ll release him outside, so. Bye.”

The last sight he caught of Draco as he left was Astoria reaching up to smooth the collar of his robes, speaking in her soothing tones as she did so, and Draco leaning down to her upturned face, genuine attentiveness in his expression as he listened.

***

The weeks leading to Christmas proceeded without much incident. Peacefully, even, by Harry’s standards. Slytherin won the Quidditch match against Gryffindor, despite the Weasley twins’ best efforts to unseat Harry’s head from his shoulders. With Draco’s help he made just enough progress each week at Occlumency to stave off Snape’s griping, and their Sunday sessions in the Room of Requirement progressed steadily to the point where Harry, surprised at both himself and his housemates, seriously began to consider teaching them the Patronus Charm.

At night, Draco had his nightmares about once or twice a week. If Harry was not awake to notice, he came to Harry’s bed and crawled in, though he had had to be — invited, the first time.

Harry had woken up blearily, not sure at first what had roused him from sleep.

“You said I should,” whispered Draco’s voice, a hint of defensiveness about it.

He was a hazy shape against the dark midnight of the curtains he had insinuated himself behind.

Harry made no reply, just gave a barely coherent noise of acknowledgement and pulled back his bed covers. After a moment’s hesitation Draco climbed in. Absurdly, he’d brought a pillow.

It wasn’t like Harry was used to sharing his bed with anyone by any stretch — he never had, as far as he could remember, but the thing was: it was easy, because it was Draco. That first night he hadn’t moved over enough, or something, and Draco had shoved at him until he did, and then he was asleep again, curling in towards the centre of the bed facing Draco, who’d had his head buried in the pillow he’d brought. Harry had had the fading impression that as he’d fallen back into his dreams Draco had flung an arm over his shoulder, but when he woke up the next morning Draco was already back in his own bed, the weight of his body against the mattress only a memory in the creases of the linen.

They didn’t bother talking about it again. There was nothing to say.

Astoria took to sitting with them during dinner time at least three days out of seven, and the worst thing was that Harry couldn’t even dislike her properly: she was polite and well-meaning, and seemed curious about everything. Whenever she asked him a question he found himself answering carefully and thoroughly; he could not help but do so in the face of her honest engagement.

As he had learned from her letter to Draco back in September, she really did like to paint; she had sketchbooks upon sketchbooks of drawings of all sorts of things — bits of anatomy, studies of architecture, still lifes, pages of the same thing viewed from different angles, or in different lighting. Most of these did not move, but what she called her ‘true’ pieces did; there was, for instance, a vibrant watercolour of a lake Harry did not recognise, with a flock of birds diving across the surface, the trees on the far shore shifting in a faint breeze.

There was a charcoal sketch of Draco flying in the sky above the Quidditch pitch. His figure was quite small, but Harry recognised the way he swerved.

“Impressive, isn’t it?” Draco said. “Mother urged me to paint, you know, when I was younger, but I always wanted to go outside and wander the grounds instead.”

“I guess she’d approve of the match,” Harry said, and swallowed the rest of the words stuck in his throat.

“The match?” Draco echoed, sounding — amused, maybe.

“Astoria,” Harry tried. “You like her.”

“I do,” Draco said, his smile effortless, his voice untroubled.

They liked each other, so — fine. It was fine, and anyway there was too much to do, and other more important things to worry about. Hagrid, who had been gone since the school year had started, returned one day out of the blue, and Hermione in her excitement actually came right up to the Slytherin table to fetch him down so that they could visit together. There was talk of giants, and recruiting, and failure, and Harry was reminded forcibly that there was a war. He knew that. He hadn’t forgotten.

He hadn’t forgotten, but it didn’t really feel like the war was upon them: it was somewhere, but it was not yet within Hogwarts, and it was difficult to imagine that it ever would be. An owl came from Sirius, saying nothing much at all, just asking how he was, and whether he was coming to Grimmauld Place for the break. Harry wrote back in the affirmative, but received no reply.

Draco, too, received letters from his parents, and the one from Lucius set him to pacing the length of their dormitory.

“What is it?” Harry asked.

The dorm wasn’t empty: it was the hour of the night when everyone was moving in and out, grabbing towels, changing, brushing teeth, and, in Theo’s case, mumbling about his latest passion, international standards for space dilation.

“Come on,” Draco said, slanting at look at Harry’s trunk, so Harry took out his Invisibility Cloak, bundled in a towel, and they left together.

Without discussing it, they both made for that alcove near the Astronomy Tower, and only once there did Draco say in a whisper, “He thinks he can play both sides.”

They sat down on the window’s ledge without taking off the Cloak, and by necessity shoulder pressed against shoulder; their disembodied legs dangled over the edge.

Draco went on: “He refuses to say what it is exactly the Dark Lord wants, but he keeps asking me about you, and about Dumbledore.”

“What will you tell him?”

“I’ve already told him things,” Draco replied. “Like to stop being delusional.”

“Yeah, right,” Harry said. “You didn’t say that.”

“I implied he was putting Mother and I in danger,” Draco amended, and that sounded much more believable.

“But he won’t listen.”

“He’s been moving in the Ministry. I don’t know what for.”

“What does he expect you to know? About me, about Dumbledore?”

Under the Cloak, Draco turned to give him a look, but they were so close all Harry got was a faint idea of eyelashes and grey irises.

Harry took a guess — if he were Lucius, and he were playing both sides — “I’d want to know things that would benefit me, so that I could measure the potential for success on each side. Even if I could not know what Dumbledore is planning, I’d like to get a measure of his confidence. And,” he paused, “I’d want to know the level of attachment Harry Potter has to my son, so that I can be certain of his protection should my plans fail.”

“That’s right,” Draco said. “But he’s also fishing for, I think, specific information. I just don’t know what.”

“What should we do?”

Draco was silent. Then he asked, “Is there a ‘we’, for this?”

Harry began, “If anything happened to Lucius —“

“It’d probably be better for you.”

Harry frowned unhappily. “It wouldn’t be, for you.”

“It’s one or the other, Potter.”

Shifting angrily, Harry nearly smashed his glasses into Draco’s cheek. “That doesn’t mean that I, that I would —“

“I know you’re a hero,” Draco said quietly, and he looked _wan_, like the knowledge of it ate at him. “But.”

They both heard what he didn’t say, which was that there were no heroic solutions to this problem.

For a while they stayed there wordless in the alcove, in the high and the cold, invisible and miserable. As the half-moon came out from behind a cloud, however, Draco said to the misting silver, “I wish he’d agreed to stay with Mother at Ursa-at-Sea.”

“I wish, too,” Harry replied. “Will you tell me if there’s anything you want me to do?”

“Harry, you know I will.”

***

On the second last day of term he saw Hermione by herself, ashen-faced across the Great Hall, and heard the whispers that Ron’s father was in St. Mungo’s, dying. There were no Weasleys at the Gryffindor table.

“What happened?” he asked Hermione urgently, as soon as he could catch her in the corridors, but she only shook her head and said she’d see him at Grimmauld Place.

Tonks and Lupin came to apparate them out from Hogsmeade in the early morning, when the sun was still just a concept, alive below the horizon but not quite there. He barely got to whisper a goodbye to Draco before the house-elf (in fact, it was Dobby) sent him with a crack into the Entrance Hall where Hermione was already standing, tear tracks down her cheeks and no shoes on her feet. She jumped into his arms and sobbed.

Lupin filled him in as they walked down to the village: Arthur Weasley had been attacked by Voldemort’s snake while on duty for the Order, and because he had been alone in a remote location no one had found him until yesterday morning, when he had already lost a huge amount of blood and the venom had penetrated deep into his system. He was currently comatose, under a web of spells and full of potions, but — they did not expect him to last until noon.

Grimmauld Place was unoccupied, save for Sirius, who, as they arrived, yelled from the kitchen, “And stay there!”

Out of the corner of his eye, Harry caught a movement that might have been Kreacher. He’d had little contact with the elf; only once during summer had he seen Kreacher face-to-face, when the door to his bedroom had opened and Kreacher had shuffled in muttering to himself, at first apparently unaware that Harry was even in the room. Then, when he’d noticed, he’d given a startled jump and mumbled something about there finally being another Slytherin in the House of Black, and vanished.

“Padfoot,” Lupin called as he shut the front door, “I’ve brought Harry and Hermione, and I think — I think the Weasleys will be coming soon as well.”

“Moony.” Sirius appeared in the hallway. “I’ve got tea brewing.”

“I can’t stay,” Lupin said. “Dumbledore needs me back on scene, they want to find out —“ he cut himself off. “Tonks needs to get back to the Ministry, too. Will you be all right?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Sirius asked, but the smile was a contortion.

“Right,” Lupin replied, distracted. “Okay. I have to go. I’ll see you later.”

“See you,” Tonks said, her hair a dark plain brown. She opened the door again and after a few seconds Harry heard the pops as they both disapparated.

The three of them went to sit in the kitchen. Harry held his tea in his hands until it was tepid.

At ten past two the Weasleys arrived. Mrs Weasley came in first, and Harry remembered how she had fussed over him, when he had been sent to stay with them after the Quidditch World Cup.

She stared vacantly now at the stove and said, “He held on for as long as he could.”

Behind her came her children: Ginny, the twins, Bill. Ron. Charlie, who must have come back from Romania when he’d received the news. Harry stood up awkwardly. None of them looked at him.

“I’m sorry for the inconvenience, Sirius,” Mrs Weasley continued hollowly. “There’s some paperwork to take care of, and — and. The funeral. It will be a few days. But after that we’ll return to the Burrow. It’s — I know we could Floo, but Arthur’s — the body — he’s still there, and I — it’s closer, here.”

“Of course you should stay for as long as you’d like,” Sirius said.

“Thank you,” said Mrs Weasley. She sank into a chair Hermione offered to her. In the grey kitchen light, amidst the fading blue cupboards and the unpolished floors, the chipped cups and dirty dishes, the red of her hair was washed out, like she was turning into a ghost.

“Mum,” said Bill. “I can go talk to Percy. Listen, Mum. Charlie and I will take care of everything that needs to be arranged. Okay?”

“He said he’d be back for breakfast,” Mrs Weasley whispered, heedless of her son’s words. “He joked that he wished he could bring the paper to read, because it was so dull.” Slowly, she brought her hand with her wedding band up to her mouth, and then abruptly her expression collapsed: she began to weep; the low sound threaded through the room like a needle, thin and relentless and piercing.

With a sob Ron rushed out of the room; they heard the thuds as he ran up the stairs.

Harry and Hermione looked at each other, then followed.

They found him folded in the hallway that lead to their rooms from the summer. When they knelt down next to him he buried his head deeper into his knees and tried to squash down the ugly heaving cries that were pushing their way through his mouth.

“Ron,” Hermione said. She put her arms around him, and after a beat he let her. Harry caught a glimpse of his face: wet, the eyes screwed shut, skin pink from emotion.

Harry didn’t know what to do. Cautiously, he placed a hand on Ron’s shoulder, applying more pressure when Ron didn’t shake him off.

No one else came up to the hallway.

After a long time, Ron said, hiccuping, his voice a ruin, “I never knew Dad could look like that.” He removed himself from Hermione’s embrace and slumped listlessly against the wallpaper. “He looked like — he was still lucid when we first got there, you know? He stared at each of us and said our names. It looked like it hurt him to talk.” He paused. “And Percy wasn’t even fucking _there_.”

“But you were, Ron,” Hermione said helplessly, choking on her shared sorrow. “You were, and — and everyone. He loved you.”

“He looked _weak_,” Ron continued, not responding. “I didn’t, I didn’t know. I walked into the room and the first thing I thought was, I thought, he’s dying. He looks like someone who’s dying. That’s what I thought.”

“Ron,” Hermione said again.

“And they won’t even say what he was guarding,” Ron said. He turned to Harry. “Do you know?”

“No,” Harry told him.

Like a man drowning, Ron sucked in air. He rocked forward then back again and hit his head hard on the wall: _thump_, _thump_, _thump_. He said: “Dad’s dead. _Dad’s dead_. He’s dead.”

They sat there with him for what must have been hours, because they didn’t leave until Charlie came up to get them for dinner. None of them were hungry.

***

The funeral was on the Monday before Christmas Eve. It was a small, private affair. Most of the attendees, as far as Harry could tell, were Order members, or family, like the Prewetts. Fleur Delacour, surprisingly, was there on her own, a black veil across her features, sticking to Bill’s side like glue throughout the entire proceeding. Percy didn’t come.

It was held at the Burrow, and the day was sunny: cold and crisp winter, every colour vivid and every sound pure; you could see for miles and miles across the fields that surrounded the teetering house that had been so full of love and now was overflowing with grief.

They cut some of his hair to turn into fire — each Weasley removed a small lock, and added it to the shallow bowl. As the fire burnt they lowered the coffin into the earth, and when Arthur Weasley was buried and the last lick of flame guttered out, they scattered the meagre ashes across the threshold of the house, so that, Mrs Weasley said — or perhaps prayed — he would watch over his children and his children’s children forevermore.

Once it was done Harry retreated to a shadowed, secluded spot, out of sight of everyone else. Hermione was talking with Ron, and he didn’t understand half the references she made, because he hadn’t lived them, didn’t know these people, and it had felt like an intrusion to be there.

“If he won’t …” came a voice from around the corner, followed shortly by the twins. They stopped when they saw him, and an unpleasant expression came upon their identical faces.

“Harry Potter,” they said.

“Sorry,” Harry said, not sure why he was apologising, except that he felt guilty. “I’ll just …” He gestured, hoping to leave.

“You know it was because of you,” one of the twins began to say, and the other put a restraining hand on his shoulder. He threw it off. “You know it was, George.”

The one who was George said, “Leave it.”

“No,” Fred said vehemently, and stepped closer to Harry. “Bill said so. He said Dad was guarding the Hall of Prophecy, and it’s for _you_, Potter.”

“Prophecy?” Harry echoed.

“Tell me,” Fred hissed, driving Harry back against the wall of the house, “why our dad had to die for you.”

“Fred,” George said. “It’s not —“

“It IS!” Fred yelled at him. “He’s the Boy Who Lived, isn’t he? Why does he get to be the one who lived? He spends all his time cosied up with Draco Malfoy, with all those snakes — who’s to say he’s even on our side?”

“I’m,” Harry said. “I’m on your side.”

“Are you? And what side is Malfoy on? Bill says Lucius Malfoy has been skulking around the Ministry lately, whispering into ears. Did you know _that_?”

Harry put his hand into his pocket and gripped his wand. “Draco isn’t his father —“

“To hell,” Fred said, his tone arctic, “with your rationalisations.” And then he punched Harry in the stomach.

As Harry doubled over, Fred kneed him on the chin, then punched him again, this time across the cheekbone, dislodging his glasses. They fell to the ground, and, even as they fell, another punch was delivered to his other side; Harry raised his hands above his head as he slid downward.

“Fred, no!” cried George, lunging forward.

Fred said, fighting against George’s restraint, “Got your wand out, haven’t you, you snake? Go on, then.”

“_Accio glasses_,” Harry cast, as soon as he got his breath back, then pushed the slightly bent frames back onto his nose.

“Merlin,” Fred said. “I hate you.”

“What did you mean, when you said prophecy?” Harry gasped out.

“Fuck you,” Fred spat.

George shoved him away. He said, “Potter, that shouldn’t have happened.”

“Really,” Harry said flatly.

“You can punch me back,” George offered. “That would be fair.”

Harry looked at him, at the devastation writ in the way they were holding themselves, at the way Fred’s clenching and unclenching fist was mirrored in the movements of George’s hand. He understood then that they were of one mind, at least in this, and that mind was torn: it could just as easily have been George who had hit him, and Fred who had held George back.

Harry said, “No, I don’t think it would be. Your Dad just died.”

Fred moaned; he sank onto his knees in the dirt.

“Can you,” George said with effort, and got out his wand. “Do you want me to heal that?”

“No,” Harry replied, and didn’t say it was because he wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t also be hexed. He thought fast. “You two can apparate, can’t you? I want to go back to Grimmauld Place.”

“Yeah. It might be better if we — if Mum doesn’t —“ George shook his head. He said to Fred, “I’ll be right back.”

It might’ve been a gamble; Harry supposed there was a slim chance he would be apparated to the edge of a cliff somewhere and pushed over, but George, despite everything, was a Weasley, and Harry thought that he could trust him that much. Still, it was a relief when the door with the serpent knocker lurched into his vision. George let go of him and left immediately without another word.

Sirius was still at the wake. Harry went to Walburga’s portrait and tugged open the curtains.

“Harry Potter,” she said when she saw him. “What happened to your face?”

“Mrs Black,” he greeted her. “I got punched.”

“By whom?”

“Some Weasleys. Their father died, you see.”

“Blood traitors,” she spat. “Besmirching the house of my ancestors. I’m glad to hear that one of them died.”

Harry leaned tiredly against the opposite wall. His left eye felt swollen. “They say that Arthur Weasley died because of me.”

She scrutinised him, and said, “I knew of a Harry Potter. Henry Potter.”

“You did?” Harry said, astounded both by the information and the offering of it.

“He was outspoken against Ministry policy that forbid our interference with the war. The Muggle war,” she clarified. “Before he ruined your name, the Potters held to the old ways. Father used to say it was a waste.”

“My mother was a Muggleborn,” Harry told her.

“Yes,” she said. “I know which Harry Potter you are. I’d heard.”

“Is it such a terrible thing?” Harry asked wistfully, and before she could tell him yes it was, continued: “What’s it like, being a portrait? Is it like being a ghost?”

Walburga took a long time to reply. “It is being as a memory.”

“Is it accurate? Are you immutable? Is it your soul, that’s left behind?”

“It is not a soul,” Walburga said. “It is a spell, and an artist’s depiction.”

“Then are you, you? What happens really, when a wizard dies?”

“In Merlin’s time, the sorcerers of Annwn said that it was a return to the magic from whence we came.”

“Then since you’re here, has part of you not returned? You’ve stayed?”

“No,” Walburga corrected, and her voice was almost patient. “I have gone. I am not a ghost, Harry Potter. A ghost is a regret chained to the earth. I am a memory of Walburga Black, a version of her taken at the time of painting. You know this. You asked me before, when I was painted.”

“But I don’t understand,” Harry said. “If you’re not you, then it seems cruel to keep an imitation. And if you are you, then there should not be — there wouldn’t be anything to cry about.”

“It is tradition,” Walburga said, raising her chin. “The leaving of a portrait gives the future generations a connection.” More quietly: “I was supposed to be there, for my children.”

“But you were painted after Regulus died,” Harry recalled.

“Not quite. The unawakened canvases were updated. Aristides Nott saw to it personally, following the passing of his father, who did the original rendition.”

“I see.” He let the silence settle, for some minutes. Then he told her, “It’s Christmas, you should know. Yuletide, I mean. I saw Draco again at Hogwarts. He’s hidden Narcissa away. She’s safe.”

“Darling young Cissy,” Walburga said. “Where is she?”

“I can’t say. You said canvases, plural, just now. Perhaps you could visit her. She’s not at Malfoy Manor.”

Walburga stared at him, considering, and then she lifted up her heavy robes and strode out of the side of the frame.

Harry sat down on the floor, but she didn’t return before he heard the sound of apparition outside: Sirius with Hermione. He closed the curtains and went up the stairs, two at a time, finding the room Ron had chosen for him with the snake in the carpet. He shut the door.


	10. Chapter 10

Hermione went to stay with her parents for Christmas and New Year, so when Hedwig came on Christmas Day with Draco’s present, it was just Harry and Sirius in the kitchen.

“Hey girl,” Harry said to her, smoothing the feathers on her head. “Looks like you got there all right. How was Draco? Thank you.”

She hooted at him and nibbled affectionately on his hair as he untied the package.

Once she’d gone, Harry turned to the present. Hedwig had carried it alone; it was a lot smaller than the one from the year before.

It was three eggs, in egg cups. They were a warm, pale yellow in colour, and something about them hinted at luminescence, as though they had been somewhere sunny and had soaked in all the light.

Sirius, who had been eyeing the package suspiciously, whistled and said, “Did your Malfoy send you that?”

“Yeah,” Harry said, wondering what was special about them. Draco hadn’t included any instructions. “What do they do? Sing?”

“No,” Sirius said. “They just taste really, really good. I had some once with James. He was euphoric.”

“Er, okay.” He looked doubtfully at the sad stack of burnt toast they had managed to coax out of the wizarding equivalent of a toaster, which, like the rest of the house, seemed to be in rebellion.

“Don’t bother,” Sirius told him. “It’d be a waste. Just eat them on their own. They’re meant to be, anyway.”

“Oh.” Harry picked up a spoon and gingerly tapped it on one of the eggs. The top part of the shell promptly peeled off neatly in strips, then Vanished itself. “Huh.”

It tasted like egg, but it was — it was — he had never been any good with describing the food Draco presented to him at Christmas, and this time was no exception. Or maybe it _was_ the exception, because — euphoric, he could understand euphoric.

He had tried, clumsily, to heal the damage from Fred’s punches, and though he had managed to reduce the swelling he hadn’t managed to fix all of the bruising, or the lingering ache, and his face still betrayed the telltale signs of greenish yellow damage when closely examined. Luckily, the lighting at Grimmauld Place was dim and unenthusiastic, and he didn’t think Sirius had noticed.

When he ate the egg, he felt it all heal. A current of warmth rushed through him, and completely aside from the taste he felt suddenly well rested and steady, like he was entirely capable of shouldering the misery of the past few days after all.

He finished one, so quickly that he was surprised to find the shell empty. He asked Sirius, “Do you want one?” Sirius looked like he could use one.

“No,” Sirius declined, but he was smiling faintly without bitterness, for once. “It’s your present.” He added: “Your Malfoy’s good to you.”

“He’s a git,” Harry said, because it would have been too much to admit to anything else.

“You could invite him over, to visit.”

“To the Order headquarters?” Harry asked guardedly. “Dumbledore wouldn’t allow it, and he’s the Secret Keeper.”

“Dumbledore,” Sirius said, scowling. “It’s _my_ house.”

“Maybe someday, then. I’d like to have him over.” Harry hesitated. “Were you ever friends with his mother? Narcissa?”

“We played together as children in this house,” Sirius answered, after a long pause. “All of us.”

It seemed dangerous and unwise to ask more. Harry changed the subject. “I can see a courtyard of sorts, out of my window. Is that real? Can we access it?”

“Hm? Oh yeah. It’s real. The door to it disappeared.” Sirius scowled again. “I thought maybe Dumbledore got rid of it, but it might just be the house.”

“Can we look for it?”

“Yeah,” Sirius answered, and for a brief moment the shadows of Azkaban fell from his face. Just a brief moment. “Why don’t we?”

***

It took them two entire days of searching (and cleaning) to find the door. Harry was the one who spotted it, and he could have sworn that he had seen the exact same stretch of wall absolutely doorless countless times before. When he told his suspicions to Sirius, Sirius only grunted and said, “Figures.”

The courtyard was full of ginkgo trees in high autumn, golden leaves thick upon the branches and thicker still on the ground. At one point Sirius actually fell into the leaves, as though it were that deep, and Harry yelled in shock and got out his wand, but in the next second a great black dog burst back out, barking, and then they were both laughing.

It was different to the view from Harry’s room, and he said so.

“It’s been too long since anyone’s come out here,” Sirius said. “I think it must have desynchronised from the rest of the house. What do you see from you room?”

“There’s a garden, and a lawn. It looks like spring or summer.”

“Is there any room that has a view of winter?”

They searched again; room after room after room. Harry found it: it was another door that had not been there before. The wood was a painted navy-black and it had no handle, just a metal plaque where the handle might have been with an engraving of a snake. Harry touched it, and the door opened.

The room inside was in perfect order. The bed was made, the furniture polished, a vase of flowers on an end table, a candle burning the smell of apples into the air.

And outside: snow falling onto bare branches.

“This was Regulus’ room,” said Sirius, a nameless emotion in his voice. “Kreacher must be keeping it in order, that fraud. How did you get in? Regulus always locked it.”

“I don’t know. It just swung open.”

“Hm.” Sirius stepped into the room and began to haphazardly look through drawers and wardrobes.

Watching him warily, Harry asked, “Can we do something with this? To resync the courtyard?”

“Maybe,” Sirius replied. He went over to the windows and opened one of them. A chilly wind blew in.

“What would happen if I jumped down?” Harry wondered curiously.

“I wouldn’t advise that you try.” Sirius shut the window again.

Hermione returned on the second day of the new year to find them preoccupied with the mystery of the courtyard; Sirius was certain he could figure it out, and there had been a lot of half-crazed scribblings on large sheets of parchment, some of which had been in runes. It was good to see him so energised, but on the other hand it was alarming, because Harry hadn’t been aware that his godfather was such a —

“What?” Sirius asked.

“Er,” Harry said. “I mean, you’d struck me as being kind of a. A delinquent. Sorry. I didn’t realise that you were also, er.” Incredibly smart.

Sirius looked hugely insulted. “Didn’t Remus ever tell you anything? We Marauders made the Map, Harry, and I’ll have you know James and I headlined that endeavour.”

“The … map?” Harry thought that there might have been some mentions to a map in Sirius’ letters of the previous year, but it had never been quite clear what exactly it was he was referring to.

“That’s right,” Sirius told him with pride. “The Marauder’s Map. Covers all the passages in Hogwarts, and tracks the movements of beings and beasts within it. I’ll have to ask Moony where it’s got to.”

Hermione was still subdued, but she seemed to welcome the distraction of the synchronisation problem wholeheartedly, and after burying herself in half a dozen books had a long list of things she wanted to try. She got into a few rather heated debates with Sirius about the correct positioning of anchoring circles according to the current alignment of the planets, and even argued about where the house’s corner pins _should_ have been, never mind where they actually were, until Sirius finally got fed up and said:

“Look. Was it me, or was it you, who grew up in this house? It was me. I grew up here. I know this place.” Then he blinked and looked disconcerted with himself for saying it.

Secretly, Harry was hoping to ask Walburga’s portrait, since it was likely she would have some ideas, but everytime he drew back the curtains she wasn’t there.

They made slow progress. By the time they were due to return to Hogwarts their collective efforts had only managed to convince two more sets of windows to change to winter, and those needed to be watched over the next few weeks in case they decided to visit another season early.

“Maybe I’ll go get Kreacher to help,” Sirius said dryly on the morning Lupin and Tonks came once more to collect Harry and Hermione.

“I think that might be a good idea — I think you should,” said Hermione, who had never given up on her house-elf campaign, although all her attempts to befriend Kreacher thus far had failed.

“Listen, Sirius,” Harry said, drawing him aside. “I wanted to say …”

Sirius cocked his head, looking at him expectantly.

Harry glanced at the curtains covering Walburga’s portrait. “I just. Er. It’ll be okay, won’t it?”

It wasn’t what he meant to say, because he wasn’t sure how to say it. Sirius had looked better the past few days, but now Harry was leaving, and he thought he owed it to Sirius to check that — that he would hang on.

“It’ll be fine, Harry. Hogwarts is safer than anywhere,” Sirius said, misunderstanding him entirely.

“Yeah,” Harry agreed, and pulled out a smile.

“Use that mirror I gave you if you need me.”

“Okay,” Harry promised. Lupin had flagged down the Knight Bus and it was time to go.

***

On the first day back one of the Weasley twins was hit with a Tripping Jinx while the two of them were walking down one of the main staircases leading to the Great Hall during the busiest fifteen minutes just before lunch, when the corridors were packed with hungry students. Fred Weasley fell down twelve steps and was obliged to take a detour to the hospital wing, where, reportedly, Madam Pomfrey waved her wand over him and discharged him within ten seconds.

Draco Malfoy, as it turned out, had also been on his way to lunch with the fifth-year Slytherin contingent when the incident occurred. He’d been on an adjacent moving staircase.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Harry told him, as they sat down to eat.

“Do what?” Draco asked, singsong, passing the plate of steak and kidney pies over so that Harry could take one. “By the way, Potter, _what_ was that Yuletide present you sent me?”

“They were KitKats, as you well know, since you’re capable of reading.”

“Why were they packaged that way? What was the purpose of breaking them down the middle?”

“So you can share them with someone, I guess.”

“They weren’t supposed to … do something?”

Harry bit back a laugh, remembering his own reaction to the eggs. “No. Did you not like them? I’ll eat them, if you didn’t.”

“There aren’t any left,” Draco pronounced haughtily. “I liked the strawberry flavoured ones the best.”

“Those were from Japan.” Actually, a lot of the different flavours were. Not to be distracted, Harry wrenched the conversation back to the original topic: “It’s lucky no one saw you.”

“No,” Draco denied. “It’s _cunning_ that no one saw me, since I planned it that way. If someone punches you, Harry, then you punch them back. If you don’t, I will.”

“We were at the funeral.”

“Did seeing him fall down the stairs make you feel better?” Draco asked expectantly.

“It wasn’t necessary,” Harry said, because he refused to say yes, it had. “How did you even know?”

“Great Aunt Walburga, of course.”

“So there was a portrait there.”

“Mother was delighted. Thanks for sending her over.”

Harry poured some more pumpkin juice from the pitcher. “I didn’t tell Walburga who exactly punched me, though.”

“Please. As if I couldn’t make an educated guess.”

“Still a fifty-fifty chance.”

Draco rolled his eyes.

“It didn’t hurt that much. It was only a couple of punches.” It came out very nonchalant; Harry patted himself mentally on the back.

“And it was only a few steps! It’s not like he’s some frail Muggle; he’s not going to get brain trauma so pathetically easily. Did he look like he was hurt? He didn’t even sprain an ankle.” Draco made an exasperated sound.

Fred Weasley _had_ looked like he was hurt, but not from the fall. All of the Weasleys still looked hurt; when people laughed near them they turned to the noise and then turned back away with a jerk, their faces pinched and lost.

But it was also true that Draco could have done a lot worse, and had not with deliberate calculation; the part of Harry that was indignant and angry, who had endured years of the twins’ hissing taunts behind his back just for being a Slytherin, felt vindicated.

“Fine,” Harry sighed. “An eye for an eye.”

“Just so.”

***

The next morning, the papers were full of news about the mass breakout from Azkaban, and an owl Draco had sent to his father returned with the letter unopened.

Draco pretended like it was a reply instead, and in the commotion about the escaped Death Eaters no one save Harry noted his performance as anything out of the ordinary.

Down the table, Harry overheard snatches of conversation:

“Isn’t Rookwood your second cousin?”

“Four times removed, so it hardly matters —“

“Potter probably knows …”

“The Blacks wouldn’t, and anyway I heard —“

“… so much the issue, but more on how he plans to achieve it.”

“— neither would Malfoy, obviously, because —“

“Harry,” Pansy said, getting his attention with a hand on his shoulder. “Are we still swotting away Sunday?”

“What? Oh, yeah. Yeah we are.” He said into her ear, “I was thinking it’s time for Patronuses.”

“Excellent.” She smiled in a distinctly flirtatious manner at him. “I’ll pass word.”

“Thanks, Pans.”

“So, Parkinson,” Draco commented casually later as they made their way to double Charms.

“Er, no, I don’t think so,” Harry said.

“She doesn’t bother with things she doesn’t like.”

What Harry remembered was that Pansy liked Draco. He cleared his throat. “Still don’t think so.”

“You don’t like her?”

“‘Course I like her.” Harry didn’t want to talk about _dating_ (possibly not ever, if the conversational partner was Draco, of all people). But he could see that Draco’s mind was on other things as well; he was gripping his bag too tightly and when Harry opened his mouth again he shot over a warning look. Harry said, “What would Pansy and I even talk about, if we went out?”

Draco smirked suggestively. “Merlin, Potter. Didn’t you know? You don’t have to talk.”

“What,” Harry retorted hotly, “like you don’t talk with Astoria —“ he clamped his mouth shut.

Draco only said lightly, “You get along with Pansy. You talk all the time.”

“Yes, but,” Harry said.

“But what?” Draco prodded, like he actually really wanted to know, and Harry was making an honest attempt to craft a suitably vague answer when, thank god, Flitwick entered the classroom and put an end to that excruciating line of query.

They got their chance to talk properly in the short break after Charms; Harry walked swiftly out of the classroom almost before Flitwick had finished dismissing them, Draco on his heels; as one they approached the secret passageway behind the tapestry in the Charms corridor and, checking to see the coast was clear, entered.

They leaned against opposite sides on the narrow steps and waited to see if anyone had followed. A few minutes passed. They were alone.

The passageway was illuminated with an old candle which floated in midair and never seemed to completely melt; in its weak fluttering glow Draco’s face dropped its mask of general indifference. He said, “I don’t know where Father is.”

“Owls can find you under Fidelius,” Harry said, thinking aloud. “So —“

“— so it’s not that,” Draco finished. “He was with us at Yuletide, briefly. I thought he went back to Malfoy Manor after.”

“What would cause an owl to return? He could have chosen to not read the letter.”

“He might have been in a location owls cannot penetrate.”

“Like what? In the ocean?”

Doubtfully: “Some vaults in Gringotts, for instance. But the owls usually just wait outside.”

“Can you ward against owls?”

“I’m sure you can. I don’t know what the runic base would be, nor the incantation. I don’t know why he would.”

“Could this be,” Harry suggested cautiously, “connected in some way to the Azkaban breakout?”

“I don’t know,” Draco replied slowly. “I sent the owl before we came back to school.”

“Then it took a long time to return.”

Draco released a shuddering breath. “I could — go to the Manor and check if he’s there.”

“How d’you propose to do that?” Harry scoffed. “Fly all the way to Wiltshire? Take the Knight Bus?”

“I could owl Mother.” Yet he didn’t look like he wanted to: it would put her in danger.

Privately, Harry thought that Narcissa would be better equipped to deal with this than they were, and surely the fact of Lucius’ disappearance would not go unnoticed with her for long, anyway, but he also knew that if something _had_ happened to Lucius, at the Manor or elsewhere, it would be stupid to send his wife into the maw directly after.

“Maybe,” Harry offered, “he was somewhere with Volde — with _him_. You know. At Azkaban. Doing the breakout.”

“The thing is,” Draco said, looking now more panicked than before, “I don’t think he’s been … attending the meetings. So to speak.”

“You said he was playing both sides!” Harry hissed.

“He is,” Draco hissed back. “I’m sure he is. It’s — it’s what I’d do, if I were — anyway. There was something he was planning. I don’t think he would have gone to Azkaban for the breakout.”

“You think he took the opportunity to do — what?” And then Harry remembered: “Ron’s father died at the Ministry, guarding something. He was killed by Voldemort’s — for god’s sake, relax — snake. The twins told me, and they heard it from their brother: it was the Hall of Prophecy.”

Draco’s eyes were very wide. “The Hall of Prophecy.”

“They said it was —“ Harry gulped, glancing away — “my fault. To do with me, I mean. And they mentioned Lucius has been at the Ministry. He has, hasn’t he?”

“Fuck,” Draco said succinctly.

Harry said, “If you don’t want to tell your mother, then — who? Or do you want to…?”

“I want to keep her and Father _safe_,” Draco whispered despairingly, then gave a humourless laugh. “I want you safe, too, as you’ll recall.”

“All right,” Harry said, standing up straighter. “Do you want to … we could go to the Ministry, and um. Look for him. Where is the Hall of Prophecy?”

“It’s a new year, isn’t it.” Draco sounded very fatalistic. “That means I have yet to tell you that you’re crazy. Are you ready? Here it is: you’re bloody crazy, Harry Potter.”

“Maybe he’s trapped there, or —“

“It’s the Ministry of Magic!” Draco flung his hands up. “We can’t just go barging in there, and — and if Father were — if …” He couldn’t even say it.

“Maybe,” Harry said, intent on taking action, “we should tell Snape.”

“While I like Professor Snape,” Draco said, “it hasn’t escaped my attention over the years that if we tell Snape something like this we may as well tell Dumbledore.”

“Then maybe we should tell Dumbledore,” Harry concluded reluctantly.

“I can’t hand Father over to Dumbledore,” Draco said flatly.

“Then, then —“ A light dinged. “Oh. We can ask Sirius for help.”

Draco froze.

Harry pressed on: “He gave me a two-way mirror, and I think he won’t tell Dumbledore if we ask him not to.”

“Potter, he’s a convicted criminal. Isn’t he under house arrest so he doesn’t get actually arrested?”

Harry was getting rather sick of all his proposals being shot down. “He’s a good person, and also your cousin, as you like to say.”

“Yes, well,” Draco acknowledged begrudgingly, “my aunt is also a convicted criminal, freshly broken out of prison. Seems to be a family tradition.”

Harry didn’t laugh. “So … can I? Talk to your cousin?”

It was their best option. Draco still stood there and thought about it until they began to hear again the muffled rush of bodies in the corridors moving to the next lesson.

Just as it became inevitable that they would be late to Transfiguration, he said, “Tonight, then, in the Room of Requirement.”

***

“Lucius wouldn’t have been able to do anything with the prophecy,” Sirius told them. “Only the people the prophecy concerns can interact with the record.”

“So there is a prophecy about Potter,” Draco said.

“Dumbledore didn’t want you to know until it was necessary.”

“Of course he didn’t,” muttered Harry.

“Listen to me,” Sirius said with urgency. “Don’t do anything rash. The Order has guards on the Hall, if anyone had tried to enter, we would know. This could be a plot to lure you in.”

“Draco wouldn’t —“

“I’m not saying it’s Draco,” Sirius cut in hurriedly. “But neither of you know what Lucius Malfoy has been doing. You said he’s been getting more and more erratic.”

Draco looked like he regretted the admission. He said, “Father’s only trying to do what he thinks will keep us safe.”

Sirius scrutinised him through the mirror. The two of them had the same grey eyes, Harry realised with a jolt. “You don’t know what your father did during the first war, Draco. You only know that he pleaded influence under Imperius. Allow me to disillusion you unequivocally now: he was lying.”

Draco moved away, out of Sirius’ line of sight. The Room had provided them with a comfortable sitting room which had a fireplace that reminded Harry vaguely of the ones in the Manor. He wondered if the Room had taken that out of his subconscious; the idea was disquieting to consider.

Sirius wasn’t finished. “Lucius may want to keep you safe, and keep Narcissa safe, but I doubt he places the same value on Harry. If he had the choice between —“

“I _know_,” Draco interrupted; he flung the words like a curse.

“Sirius,” Harry said. “We know. But — I still want to look for Lucius.”

They stared at each other; Draco got up and paced.

Sirius said, the worry having grown on his face: “Stay at Hogwarts. There are any number of explanations for why Lucius returned an owl. Listen to me, Harry, Draco. I’ll ask Moony to keep a look out, and we won’t mention it to Dumbledore. Who knows, he might show up again within the week. All right?”

Harry looked to Draco. Draco bit out, “All right.”

It wasn’t enough. Lucius did not show up within the week, and, in fact, only returned more owls unopened. The edges of Draco’s appearance began to acquire a harsh edge, as though he had been erased and redrawn over and over again, not quite right each time. At night, his nightmares grew in frequency.

As Harry had told Pansy, that Sunday they began to work on the Patronus charm. To everyone’s astonishment, Theo managed to produce what they all agreed looked to be a frost salamander after only a few tries. Daphne, too, made a good deal of progress, though the wispy form she brought forth during her last few tries was still too indistinct to give name to. She was of the mind that it resembled a bear. Harry secretly thought it was closer to a wombat.

Draco could not even manage a hint of silver light.

It was worse than what he had done back in third year. It was a testament to how terrible he looked that no one made any ill remarks, even though Blaise appeared close to spraining something with restraint.

Preoccupied with the problem of Lucius, Harry fell asleep one night without clearing his mind and dreamed a strange dream: a black-tiled corridor, lit white and blue, and Draco walking down it towards a black door. “Draco,” he called in the dream, but there was no response, just the _thump_ of Draco’s feet on the ground and the accompanying _thump_ of Harry’s beating heart, caught within the corridor that stretched long and endless and impossible.

News came intermittently from Sirius: they had had no word of Lucius, but neither had there been any bodies found within the Ministry, or any other incidents elsewhere that could reasonably be attributed to Lucius’ doing. Be patient, Sirius said.

Narcissa found out. Her favoured eagle owl, which had a gradiented colouring that was unusually dark on top, was difficult to miss. The letter itself was short, and did not seem to bring Draco much comfort, though he got it out to peruse over and over again.

Harry, for once mindful of Draco’s privacy, caught a glimpse of one sentence despite himself. It read: _If your father did not tell you of where he was going, then he did not mean for you to follow._

***

On Valentine’s Day, the last day with a semblance of normalcy, Draco went out on a date with Astoria to Hogsmeade and Harry stayed back at Hogwarts where he was propositioned by Pansy.

Proposition may have been the wrong word, but as Pansy pushed him down onto his bed in the empty dormitory and her warm soft lips moved over his and her equally warm soft breasts pressed against his chest, Harry had difficulty thinking of an alternative. He had difficulty thinking at all.

“What,” he managed after several elongated seconds of exchanging saliva and building confusion, “are we doing?”

Pansy licked his bottom lip and said into his mouth, “Revising for our OWLs, obviously.”

“Oh,” he said stupidly, and carried on for a few more minutes of unpractised mutual groping before he tried again: “No, wait.”

Pansy sat back, her weight on his waist. She had put on wine-coloured lipstick that made her look older and it was smudged; her robes were dishevelled, her right shoulder bare.

Harry said, “I thought you liked Draco.”

Pansy blinked deliberately and smoothed her palm across his forehead, pushing back his hair. “I thought you liked Draco, too.”

“I —“ He bit back the denial. “What is this?”

“Blaise calls it passing the time.”

“You’ve been — I mean. With Blaise?”

“Blaise should be so lucky,” Pansy said scathingly. “No, I haven’t. Which is why I want to try.”

“But don’t you want —“ Harry swallowed. “You like Draco.”

Her hand was still in his hair, gentle. “If Draco liked me back,” Pansy whispered, “then I would be the one in Hogsmeade right now. He doesn’t bother unless he likes something.”

It was suddenly difficult to look at her. “He said that about you.”

Pansy smirked Draco’s smirk. “Because he got it from me.”

Or maybe they’d gotten it from each other; since first year Harry had noticed their occasional shared idiosyncrasies: the smirk, the particular drawl in that particular tone, the tilt of the chin that accompanied the raising of an eyebrow. It wasn’t significant enough to be especially remarkable, but it was there; Draco had said that he and Pansy had known each other since they were five.

Leaning down and ever closer, Pansy was saying, “You don’t have to take me out on dates. I just want to pass the time.”

“Really,” Harry whispered back, as her eyelids fluttered closed.

“Really. And the other thing I want,” Pansy said, kissing him again, “is to not talk about Draco.”

So they didn’t.

***

That night, Draco was not present during dinner. Harry was feeling too paranoid about the possible telltale remains of Pansy’s lipstick on his face to do more than scan the Slytherin table and glance toward the double doors a few times as he ate. Mostly, he tried to keep his head down toward his plate and eat as rapidly as he could.

Astoria was also conspicuously absent.

He was almost done inhaling the chicken and trying not to think of how exactly Draco and Astoria could have been _passing the time_, when a murmur ran down the table and he looked up reflexively to see Snape stride up to Dumbledore. Snape only spoke a few words, but in the next moment Dumbledore rose and the two of them walked with haste out of the Great Hall.

It was only then that he noticed that Hermione was not at the Gryffindor table, either.

He got up and ran, because it couldn’t be anything, it was some other matter, it wasn’t — it wouldn’t —

He caught up to them at the entrance; Snape turned and did not seem surprised to see him.

“Potter,” he said without emotion, “Draco Malfoy has been taken.”

“Taken,” Harry repeated, the syllables like stones. “What do you mean, taken? Sir?”

“Come,” Dumbledore said, staring ahead. “We must not waste time.”

They marched briskly down the steps and continued without breaking pace across the grounds, towards Hogsmeade.

As they moved, Snape elaborated, “Astoria Greengrass came to my office with the assistance of Hermione Granger some minutes ago. She exhibited signs of being Confunded, but she was very insistent that she had been with Draco at Hogsmeade, when Lucius Malfoy came and took Draco away. She was unable to provide further details due to her condition, and I sent her with Granger to the hospital wing.”

“Do you know anything about this, Harry?” Dumbledore asked.

“I didn’t go to Hogsmeade today, sir,” Harry replied shortly, and then, as the wave of terror rose higher and higher, confessed, “We — Draco’s father has been missing since term started. Draco was — worried, so we — we haven’t been able to find him.”

“And now he has found himself,” Dumbledore concluded. “It would have been wise to come to me when you first had indication of Lucius’ disappearance.”

Harry did not know how to reply.

“With luck,” Dumbledore went on, “we will be able to ascertain Draco and Astoria’s location at the time of Lucius’ sudden reappearance and garner some clues as to what really happened.”

They came to a hill overlooking the village, which was now empty of students, the streets quiet and the lights glowing bright behind closed windows, smoke rising from chimneys. Dumbledore cast a wordless spell that fanned from his wand as a barely perceptible breeze, and when it was done he pointed to somewhere in the dark distance and a beacon lit up above it, just for a few seconds. He said, “There, Severus,” and promptly disapparated.

“Potter, with me,” Snape said, and without further warning Side-Alonged Harry.

It was a secluded spot close to the Shrieking Shack that Harry knew; he and Draco had discovered it together in their third year. Due to the incline of the land and the positioning of the trees neither the Shack nor the buildings of the village were visible.

Dumbledore took out a device that looked like a cigarette lighter and clicked it; several balls of light flew out. He cast a number of spells in succession, then looked at Snape, who shook his head.

Harry could not tell what they were searching for, and there was nothing unusual in the clearing that he could see.

“There was no fight,” Dumbledore said finally. “And they disapparated.” He sighed. “Since Miss Greengrass’ description of events was so vague, there was always a slim chance that they left by some other means more easily trackable.”

“They?” Harry asked.

“It is likely Lucius was not alone.” For the first time in a long, long time, Dumbledore gazed at him directly. There was an air of wariness about the way he did it, but when Harry only stared reticently back he seemed to relax marginally. “Harry, if there’s anything you know that you think may help, tell me now.”

This was for Draco; he couldn’t hesitate, couldn’t negotiate. “I know that Lucius was behaving erratically. Draco thought he was playing both sides. Lucius was at the Ministry, trying to do something. And,” he added, squaring his shoulders, “I know about the Hall of Prophecy.”

Dumbledore’s eyes darkened behind the half-moon glasses. “I see. Severus?”

“As my own attendance is highly irregular,” Snape said, “I was not able to discern any fragmentary behaviour on the part of Lucius. When he was present he was silent, but I thought it not unusual given his … circumstances.”

“Lucius Malfoy cares for his son,” Dumbledore murmured. “What of the possibility that this is a collaboration between them?”

“Zero,” Harry said forcefully.

The glasses flashed, cold, impenetrable. “We do not always know the true hearts of even our closest, dearest friends, Harry. He could have —“

“He _wouldn’t_,” Harry protested vociferously. “There might not have been a struggle, but Draco didn’t come down here this morning planning to be spirited away by his own father. I know it. I swear it.”

For one precious ticking minute Dumbledore stood in silent judgement of this proclamation, before he raised his wand again and summoned his Patronus, a glorious silver phoenix that burst into being like an otherworldly sunrise. Dumbledore bent his head to it and spoke softly, then nodded in dismissal, whereupon it trilled, the sound just like Fawkes, and vanished in a twist of white flame.

“Will you,” he asked, looking again at Harry, “go back to Hogwarts?”

Stunned that he was being given the option, Harry said without pause, “No. If you’re going to find Draco, I want to come with you.”

“Then we must away,” Dumbledore said, and held out his hand. “Severus, to the Department of Mysteries.”


	11. Chapter 11

Harry recognised the corridor leading down to the department. He said wonderingly, “I saw this in a dream.”

Dumbledore only replied, “You must keep up with your Occlumency, Harry.”

They travelled swiftly inward; the wall moved strangely as they entered the circular atrium, lurching as though it were about to spin, but Dumbledore made a flicking motion with his wrist and the room shuddered to a standstill, the door directly in front of them opening automatically.

It was the Hall of Prophecy. It looked infinite. Since this was the wizarding world, for all Harry knew, it _could_ have been infinite. He gaped at the countless rows of destiny until, following Dumbledore’s sure strides, he stopped in front of one that held his name preceded by a question mark.

Dumbledore cast another series of spells nonverbally, then announced: “We are alone.”

Snape said, “I will ward the parameters,” and removed himself further down the aisle.

Something wasn’t right. Harry asked apprehensively, “Where is Draco?”

Dumbledore said, “That I have yet to ascertain, but it is likely that this chain of events is part of an attempt by Voldemort to acquire this prophecy.”

“I don’t understand,” Harry said. If Draco wasn’t here, then —

“I was reluctant,” said Dumbledore cryptically. “But it is time. Only those whom the prophecy concerns may remove it. Take the orb, Harry, and destroy it. Dropping it from a height will do.”

“You said we were going to find Draco.” But even as Harry said it, he realised that it had only been his assumption, not Dumbledore’s promise.

“This must come first.”

And he should have known, because it was Dumbledore, who knew enough about what Draco meant to Harry to place Draco at the bottom of a lake, but who’d warned Harry, all the way back in first year, that Draco Malfoy was the son of a Death Eater, and that Draco took after his father.

Harry took the prophecy from its dusty place on the shelf and smashed it on the ground.

From its broken shards rose a pearly shade; it spoke in booming tones that did not match its features, which Harry recognised vaguely as belonging to Professor Trelawney, whom he had seen at the staff table during Welcoming Feasts (the only public meal she ever attended). Her words hammered into him mercilessly, despite his panicked distraction, and he found himself stepping back.

Once it was over, Dumbledore nodded and Vanished the remains of the glass ball.

As he did so, a silver Patronus in the shape of a wolf bounded forth from thin air. It said in Tonks’ voice: “Aunt Narcissa is here.”

***

Narcissa looked disconcertingly out of place in the Tonks house. She held herself stiffly next to the hat stand bedecked with all manner of colourful scarves and comfortable coats and proclaimed thinly, “The Manor has been closed to me. I cannot access it.” She turned to Harry. “What has happened to Draco?”

“Lucius took him.”

“Cissy,” said a woman who must have been Andromeda Tonks.

Something passed over Narcissa’s face; in anyone else Harry would have described it as a flinch. She said, “Lucius is under Imperius.”

“Enough —“ Snape began, but Dumbledore raised a finger.

Dumbledore ordered, “Explain.”

“I suspected; I could not be certain,” she said, and it was not just the electric Muggle lighting in the hall, her features really were more pale and bloodless than usual. “But I am sure now: Lucius would not cease contact for weeks and then remove Draco from Hogwarts without at least consulting me.”

“Would he have taken Draco to the Manor?” Harry asked her.

She held up one hand, palm up, a gesture of futility. “I think it likely, but Lucius holds the wards. Since I cannot enter, I cannot know.”

Calculation was in Dumbledore’s next words. “Then he could have taken Draco anywhere. If he is under Imperius, that is all the more likely.”

Another Patronus arrived; it was a silver monkey, swinging from invisible branches, and it said in a voice Harry did not recognise, “No anomalies. Likely undetected.”

“Good,” Dumbledore said, and turned on his heels to enter the Tonks living room. Snape, Tonks, Andromeda and her husband followed forthwith, leaving Narcissa and Harry alone in the hallway.

There was the faintest of sounds; Harry looked up and saw a moth, powdered body fragile and insubstantial, throwing itself upon the domed clouded glass covering of a fifteen-watt light bulb.

He looked back down. Narcissa was watching him.

Harry told her, “I want to go to the Manor.”

Dumbledore no doubt would save Draco if he could, but in the meanwhile he would talk and confer and barter time in exchange for prudence, because to Dumbledore Draco was wholly expendable.

Narcissa held out her hand again, this time in invitation.

***

They appeared in front of the gates. The inner gates to the Manor proper, not the outer gates of the property. The surrounds were completely dark, save for a green-blue glow in the direction of the eastern garden, which Harry knew to be Narcissa’s own specially cultivated night-blooming roses.

She said, “This is my limit. Look.” She made as if to touch the cold iron of the gate: there was a reverberation and a sound like snarling. The gates heaved outward, as though to bite.

Harry was already preoccupied with the warm orange radiance dancing from a single window. Someone was home. He pointed unnecessarily, saying, “Isn’t that the second floor sitting room…?”

He placed his other hand against the gate as he said it.

The gate opened.

“What —“

Three things happened in rapid succession.

With a hideous crack Bellatrix Lestrange — not at all improved from her photo in the paper, if anything more deranged — apparated into existence beside Narcissa. Bellatrix said, “Cissy! Dearest Cissy, how good to see you. And you’ve brought me a present!”

In shock, Harry half-stumbled, half-fell through the gate.

Immediately, there was a second crack. Soddy raised a finger and stopped his fall. She said, “Harry Potter must come _now_,” and grabbed him by his leg.

And then he was in the Manor’s dungeons.

***

Harry didn’t know which of the Malfoy ancestors had thought it prudent to teach the house to grow dungeons large enough to hold one hundred people. It didn’t seem like the sort of project one undertook on a whim, for fun, yet the resultant conclusion was that at some point each of the cells had been put to use. Then again, the Manor had upwards of sixty-five bedrooms on an average day and Harry was sure that those had never seen simultaneous occupancy, either.

The house-elves did not neglect the dungeons, but the admirable degree of cleanliness was perhaps the only welcoming aspect of the place; the ceiling was unbearably low, the stones grey and smothering. Without windows there was no wind, and the air felt thick, difficult to draw in without conscious effort.

Draco was in one of the cells.

The cell door was open, which was strange, until Harry hurried closer and Draco saw him and said, “My hero,” without even a crumb of sarcasm, and Harry realised that Draco was Confunded, as Astoria had been.

Astoria had at least been able to manage basic coherency; Draco could not accomplish the simple task of standing without keeling to one side. After a fruitless minute of coaxing, Harry let him sit on the low wooden bench and felt in his robes: all the pockets were empty. He tried an _Accio_; it returned nothing.

“Where’s your wand?” he asked, taking Draco by the shoulders.

“Did you know,” Draco imparted seriously, “that if you sit by the windows at midday your eyes are the exact colour of the lake?”

Harry took a moment to realise that he meant the windows in Slytherin, and then another moment to digest this. He swore, and turned to Soddy. “How long as he been like this?”

“Master Malfoy is feeding Master Draco a potion, Harry Potter,” she answered. “But Master Draco smashed the glass, so Master Malfoy used a spell. Master Malfoy is not being well, sir.”

“Who else is in the Manor?”

“Master Malfoy only.”

“Why is Draco in the dungeon?”

At this Soddy twisted her ears and said miserably, “Master Malfoy ordered Soddy to take Master Draco away, and, and Master Draco is belonging in his bedroom, but the rooms is not being safe, sir. Soddy is ashamed, sir.”

Harry tried to process this; fear, like frost, seeped into his bones. “You mean that the rooms in the Manor aren’t safe. That the dungeon is safer? Why? What happened to the rooms?”

“Dark wizards came,” Soddy moaned. “Dark wizards came and they hurt the Manor.”

“Harry,” Draco said, “Harry, Harry, Harry.” He laughed loudly.

Harry clamped a hand over his mouth and stared in the direction of the stairs in alarm. “Shh, Draco.”

Draco tried again to speak; his voice came out muffled. He blinked widely in astonishment, then laughed again, the huffing breaths hot against Harry’s palm.

Revelation struck. “Soddy,” Harry said frantically, “you’re not affected by Anti-Apparition Jinxes, right? Can’t you take Draco to Hogwarts? Or — or Ursa-at-Sea. You must know it. Either one will do. Please.”

Soddy shook her head. “Master Malfoy ordered Soddy to stay at the Manor, Harry Potter. Soddy is loyal.”

“But —“ Harry lifted his hand so that Draco could breathe, then pushed Draco’s head down to his shoulder, holding him in place — “it’s dangerous here. You know it is. And you _can_ disobey, Dobby did it all the time. Please, Soddy —“

But at the mention of Dobby and disobedience, Soddy flattened her ears and wailed, “No, no no no no, Soddy is good, Soddy is loyal, Soddy —“

“Okay,” Harry rushed to reassure her. “Okay. Sorry. Forget what I said. Is there any other way you can help us? You said Lucius isn’t well. What’s he doing?”

Soddy stopped crying and answered, “Master Malfoy is speaking to the spells.”

“I’m not sure what that means,” Harry told her. “Do you know why Lucius brought Draco to the Manor in the first place?”

Soddy only repeated, “Master Malfoy is not being well.”

As she spoke, a shudder ran through the bench Harry and Draco were sitting on; the walls trembled, the entire Manor shook.

“Draco,” Harry said, grabbing his arm and hurling it around himself. “We need to go. Try to keep your balance.”

“Father is halfway there,” Draco stated lucidly as they stood up awkwardly.

Harry’s gaze snapped to his face, but once more he had scattered; he smiled beatifically at Harry. He looked bright and unguarded and happy, and it turned out that that combination on him was disarming; Harry stumbled.

He put his mind to the task of getting them out of the dungeon, and then out of the Manor. Narcissa was — she had to be — just outside the gates. He should have focused on that to begin with, instead of wasting time.

They were halfway up the steps when the Manor shook again. After that, the tremors came every ten seconds or so, and once Harry forced open the heavy dungeon door they began to hear the sounds of things breaking.

It wasn’t like — it wasn’t an earthquake, or anything. The tremors were minute; they were only a symptom, not the cause. As Harry dragged Draco into the western first floor corridor that lead to the entrance hall, a door next to them slammed open and shut again; in the brief instant Harry saw a glass cabinet inside tip over, as inexorably as though someone had dragged it forward with a spell.

It _was_ a spell, or at least a spell, breaking. According to Soddy, Lucius was talking to them. The wards hadn’t permitted Narcissa entrance, only Harry. Bellatrix had anticipated their arrival. Lucius was under Imperius, but evidence suggested that its hold was unstable. Lucius, Draco had said, was halfway there.

Halfway, perhaps, to handing Harry over to Voldemort.

The entrance hall was not lit, but it had floor-to-ceiling windows pointing north, and the moon was waxing. There were shards of ceramic and marble all along its edges.

Lucius was leaning on the closed front doors.

“Father,” Draco said, that incongruous intrepid smile still alive on his face, “may I introduce, Harry, Harry Potter?”

Lucius had always been a picture of intimidation, perfectly coifed and clothed, Victorian manners or modern wit whetted and ready. Right now, in the moonshine and wreckage, he looked like a cornered animal.

He bared his teeth and said to Harry, “The Dark Lord is here.”

_Crash_. The Manor shook again.

Lucius continued, “The wards won’t hold.”

Harry said, “Will you let us go?”

“The Manor has passed from Malfoy to Malfoy for over nine centuries,” Lucius said passionately. “Do you know what the Dark Lord wants to _do_ to it? I cannot. I will not. I refuse.”

Harry trained his wand on him. “Let us through, Lucius.”

Lucius, who was now thinking out loud without full possession of his faculties, continued, “If the Dark Lord has you — it will be done. It will — he will allow me —“

“_Expelliarmus_!” Harry shouted.

It was Draco’s hawthorn wand that flew towards him. Harry, one hand holding his own wand and the other holding Draco, could not catch it. It clattered to the ground at his feet. Draco kicked at it.

“Don’t —“ Harry said, and bent down to retrieve it.

The house shook again, and this time, Harry could feel something tear. The wand rolled away.

Lucius gave a cry as though what had been ripped apart was his own heart, and even as he keened the thundering percussion of apparition boomed through the air, one after the other.

“Harry Potter,” said Voldemort in his corpse’s whisper.

But it wasn’t only Death Eaters: Dumbledore and members of the Order were there, too, and they were already fighting, or more likely continuing a fight that had been occurring outside the wards before the wards fell.

A curse with a heated, bubbling texture rebounded their way; Harry forced Draco down to the ground.

“Ow,” Draco complained, but in the next second he said in a completely different tone, “Fuck.” This time, Harry was the one being shoved away from a slicing spell that flew into the main staircase and carved through the steps, shattering two balusters into dust.

Harry crawled back; he got a death grip on Draco’s wrist, then scanned the ground frantically for Draco’s wand. He couldn’t see it. He tried to Summon it, but it was too chaotic for him to tell if the spell had worked; a wand could easily be knocked out of the air or worse, surrounded as they were by curses.

“Harry,” Draco said, and he still seemed unlike himself, but he wasn’t smiling anymore; there was panic in his voice.

“Stay with me,” Harry instructed, and tried now to locate Narcissa in the flashing spells and mix of bodies. He spied a trail of what looked like her long pale blonde hair at the farthest side away from them, but an instant later saw that it was Tonks.

Tonks would do. He could —

“Potter!” screamed Bellatrix, whirling to a stop directly in from of them. “With my darling nephew, no less. My, my. Shall we play? _Crucio_.”

Harry dropped and screamed; every nerve itched and was on fire, was encased in burning ice, he wanted to rip his own skin off, wanted to tear through his own ligaments to stop the pain, it hurt, it hurt —

It stopped, abruptly.

“Bella,” said Sirius’ voice, indistinct through the ringing in Harry’s ears. “Just because you wore those robes to Azkaban doesn’t mean you have to wear them permanently, you know.”

“Harry.” Draco pulled him up. Harry blinked, dazed. Draco held Harry’s own wand of holly. He cast a spell; the uppermost layer of pain faded away. Unfortunately, there were dozens more.

Sirius was duelling Bellatrix. She jeered and taunted at him, but he was equal to it, spitting back filth and curses, full of the terrible hatred Harry had seen hints of, always suppressed and now let out to rampage without restraint.

Dumbledore was fighting Voldemort; their continued collision was like a maelstrom above all the rest, torrents of water out of nowhere turned to spears of crystal, silent flicks of the wand which cast spells invisible to the eye until a window melted, fire and lightning and Unforgivables —

And Lucius, Lucius had rolled from the door and he was standing up again, and in his hand was Draco’s wand, and he was pointing it first at Harry, then wavering, then back.

“Father —“ Draco said, pleading, horribly aware.

“Come over here, Draco,” Lucius ordered.

Draco trembled, swayed. Didn’t go.

Lucius said, “_Imperio_.” 

Snape had said during their extra-curricular lessons that the process of Occlumency was linked to the process of resisting the Imperius Curse. Mastery of one assisted the other.

Draco had never demonstrated particular aptitude against Imperius during fourth year. But he was better than Harry at Occlumency.

Lucius crooked a finger. Docilely, Draco picked himself up off the floor and went to stand beside him.

Lucius was breathing hard. He looked upward, where Voldemort was, and then all around at the destruction of his home.

Time felt stretched; perhaps it was. Slowly, so slowly, Lucius looked back toward Harry. He cast: “_Avada Kedavra_.”

As the deathly green light burst forth, Draco, every visible cord and muscle in his neck straining, pushed at his father with all his might. Harry’s wand was still in his hand.

“Harry, are you okay?” Sirius shouted, and he was deflecting a _Crucio_ from Bellatrix, he was looking over his shoulder, moving backward, he hadn’t even seen Lucius cast the Killing Curse, hadn’t seen Draco change its path, he didn’t even know what was going on —

It clipped him on the shoulder. Harry saw it clearly, and his next thought was that it couldn’t possibly be enough, it was just a _graze_, and Sirius had only lost his footing, had only tripped, he was going to get up and ask, _what was that?_ and they would laugh — James would have laughed, because wasn’t it funny, accidentally walking backward into an _Avada Kedavra_, it was just a good joke —

Sirius was dead. His grey eyes, passed down from some distant Black ancestor, reflected the storm in the ceiling unblinking.

Draco screamed.

He wasn’t screaming about Sirius.

As though from a remove, Harry remembered: Draco trying to teach him a lesson. An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth.

A father for a godfather.

Draco had inadvertently pushed Lucius into the path of a second slicing spell; the first had ripped apart the staircase; the second ripped apart the Lord of the Manor.

Wizards could regrow bones, Harry knew. Madam Pomfrey gave you a potion and you spent the night in the hospital wing, and then you went right back to class. Students survived falls from brooms several storeys high; maybe, if they were unlucky, they broke their wrist. Years ago, Hagrid had scoffed at the idea of a car accident killing Lily and James, and once Harry had spent a term at Hogwarts he had understood why. Magic protected, healed, reknit, remade.

Lucius Malfoy was in two separate pieces. Both of them twitched — the eyes pooling with red, the hands flexing, the bared heart pumping. His magic was all around him as a tangible force, a pressure, striving for him, clutching at nerve and tissue and blood.

It wasn’t enough. The fighting around them slowed as both sides turned to watch. No one intervened, or tried to cast a healing spell. The blood pooled, the magic receded, and Lucius died.

***

“My father,” Draco declared in first year, after Harry had survived the troll in the bathroom with Ron and Hermione, “said that all the Weasleys have red hair and freckles and more children than they can afford.”

“Ron seemed all right,” Harry objected. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

“Wasn’t he the cause of the mess in the first place?” Draco pointed out fastidiously. “Father says the Weasleys live in a hovel.”

“So?”

“So those twin brothers of his made Pansy cry last week — she was so upset she skipped _class_ — you should watch out for your own instead of fraternising with the enemy, Potter.”

“Fraternising,” Harry repeated, trying out the word.

Draco sighed. He made a display of it, heaving up his shoulders far more than necessary, and as a result looked ridiculous. “Don’t worry. Father told me to make friends with you. I’ll set you straight with the right sort.”

“Yeah yeah, Malfoy,” Harry replied dismissively, having heard that part at least a dozen times already. “One day, you’ll wake up and realise your father isn’t everything.”

***

With Lucius dead, the Manor transformed. Like a child bringing its knees to its chest, it became smaller; rooms in the upper floors disappeared entirely, and the broken staircase shrunk until it was barely wide enough to fit two abreast.

The entrance hall curling in on itself brought the fighting to a draw as they all hurried outside, some apparating, others taking the more direct route and leaping through demolished windows. Voldemort screamed a command and vanished.

Ignoring it all, Harry closed the distance to Draco and touched his elbow. Draco didn’t react.

Dumbledore descended next to them. He said nothing, just looked over his glasses at Lucius, at Sirius.

“We can’t stay,” Harry whispered, his tongue as heavy as lead. He got a good grip and dragged.

The wide pebbled drive and the well maintained lawn were tinted a poisonous green. Someone had cast _Morsmordre_ into the night. Don’t look, Harry wanted to say, but Draco’s head was already tilted to the skull, his skin and hair tainted with its sickly pallor.


	12. Chapter 12

They were allowed to remove themselves to Ursa-at-Sea for one week.

They were left alone, save for a few owls from members of the Order during the day. Narcissa had been incapacitated during the initial confrontation with Bellatrix; she had tried to stop her sister from summoning Voldemort immediately, and Bellatrix had — perhaps in a rare demonstration of her unique brand of mercy — hit Narcissa with a Lunar Nightmare Curse.

Andromeda had taken the initiative and had her placed in a private, sealed and warded room at St Mungo’s, where the Healers could burn incense made from crushed belladonna leaves to ease her into a dreamless sleep until the new moon, when they would cast the countercurse at the safest hour.

Andromeda was also overseeing the burial of the body. Both bodies.

Ursa-at-Sea had the sort of beauty that hurt to perceive. It was built in a way that only magic could build, one single length of white sandstone curving in a euclidean arc away from the cliffside, long narrow windows running in slanted steps diagonal to the ground. Its namesake constellations were engraved above the front door, and celtic runes were embedded in sections of the floor inside. During odd-numbered days, it grew an observatory at sundown. On the northern side it had a lone tower that was a lighthouse, and one night Harry went up there, round and round, to light the beacon with a spell. It shone brilliantly out to sea, an invisible message hidden under Draco’s Fidelius.

They did not talk about it.

Draco’s wand had been left with Lucius, bloodstained and murderous, victim and perpetrator. It had likely been retrieved, but — Draco didn’t ask, so neither did Harry. Instead, they shared Harry’s wand — lighting fires in the grate, Warming Charms at night, _Lumos_, Summoning books from the next room, cleaning — ordinary everyday things that Harry had marveled at when he was eleven and that he no longer thought twice about. He didn’t know where the Manor’s house-elves — including Soddy — were, whether they were even supposed to now follow Draco, or if they were tied more closely to location (this seemed far more likely), but he was strangely glad of their absence.

Ursa-at-Sea had a stocked pantry, so he cooked. Draco, surprisingly, helped. Harry hadn’t expected him to be any good at it; he’d expected general aristocratic incompetence, frankly, given the life Draco had led, but Draco was methodical, if not a little too precise in his measurements, a habit carried over from brewing potions.

The harder part was getting him to eat. Once the food was plated, he lost all interest.

On the second day, Harry copied him and sat there, staring out the window.

“Why aren’t you eating?” came the question, half an hour later.

“Why aren’t you?” Harry challenged mildly.

Draco tore up a corner of bread and dipped it in the cold soup. Then he just held it there, not bringing it up to his mouth.

“I’ll eat,” Harry offered, “if you eat.”

He could tell from the look in Draco’s eyes that Draco knew exactly what had happened, but was choosing to acquiesce. Draco said, “Fine.” He picked up Harry’s wand and warmed up the soup.

On the first night they retired to different bedrooms. The next morning Harry found Draco asleep on the open rooftop, salt from the wind in his matted hair, shivering.

On the second night, Harry, prickly and diffident, walked into Draco’s bedroom with him. Draco made no comment. They got ready for bed and _Nox_‘ed the lights and pulled back the sheets and put their heads beside each other like it had all happened before. But it was different to Draco coming to him in the middle of the night from a nightmare; this was conscious, chosen.

Harry let himself sink into the mattress; with the sound of the waves outside it felt like sinking into the depths of the ocean, except that it was warm, and he wasn’t alone. He fell asleep in seconds and slept deeply for hours, and did not dream. When he woke he knew instinctively that it was still too early, and he was about to turn and go back into that pleasant, safe oblivion when he heard the soft murmur of a spell.

It wasn’t any incantation that he recognised. He lifted an eyelid and saw Draco, not quite sitting, still mostly horizontal under the covers, conjuring stars.

Or — not real stars, obviously not _real_ stars, but the space above the bed was filled with lights that seemed to promise life, and as he watched Draco added another. He looked like — like a child’s notion of god, if there was a god, a lazy and tired one, creating a miniature universe.

Harry shifted to get a better view. Draco noticed he was awake.

“Look, Harry,” he said, and he brought the wand up and traced thin, shimmering lines, joining together a constellation. “Canis Major.”

Harry’s throat hurt. He brought out his hand from under the bedding and placed it on Draco’s hand, the one that was cold from holding the wand, because it was the only way he could, in that moment, say something.

It was just like Draco to feel guilty but not apologise and instead beg for forgiveness so indirectly it wasn’t like begging at all, it was like being tricked, being manipulated, except that Harry hadn’t — he hadn’t — he had understood, in the first place, so maybe in the end Draco wasn’t asking for anything at all, maybe he was only giving, and it was Harry who was taking without paying, Harry who was the one who needed to get on his knees.

He wasn’t going to. The bridge between them was too heavy to be pillared by platitude, and anyway he wasn’t sorry. He’d thought about it and thought about it during all the hours where they did not talk, and he had drawn the conclusion that he wasn’t.

He wasn’t sorry. On the third day Harry accidentally knocked over a bowl as they made lunch. It spun off the granite benchtop and took with it their peculiar state of calm; both smashed into pieces. Harry leaned over and counted: seven, not including the slivers, the fine dust.

“Morgana’s mercy,” Draco said bitingly as he did so, “did the Muggles never teach you where to put your elbows?”

“Dudley did, yeah,” Harry rejoined, immediately spiteful, reacting to the tone. “In faces, or stomachs, mostly. Would you like a demonstration?”

“I’d rather you acted like a wizard and not an animal.” Draco flicked the wand viciously at the whisk and it stopped beating the eggs. He slammed the pan onto the stove.

Harry got right up in his face. “Shut up, Malfoy. Muggles aren’t animals.”

Draco’s mouth formed an ugly sneer. “Oh, my mistake. They breed like rabbits and fill the air everywhere with their stench. They’re vermin.”

It was a relief to be able to shout. “Muggles _flew_ to the _moon_. Wizards don’t even understand electricity, for fuck’s sake.”

“When Muggles were still crawling in their own excrement we could summon fire.”

“And when Muggles send a ship to Mars wizards will still be here with the same spells, no different, because — can’t you see — so many are too obsessed with past glory to care about the future.”

“Wizards built civilisation,” Draco said, louder, angrier. “Arthur would never have united Albion without Merlin, without magic! Avalon, Atlantis, Mutheaisa, Shambhala. What thing of beauty have Muggles ever accomplished that we did not do better, and earlier, before it was destroyed or unmade by their greed? Muggles went to the moon? Muggles would be _dead_ without us. You want to talk about the _future_? Father said —“

He stopped and looked away.

Harry said, for both of them: “Your father was full of shit.”

With a click Draco placed the wand carefully next to the eggs. Then he shoved Harry back past the mess on the floor and punched him. It was a clean strike, almost emotionless, as though Draco’s heart had not yet caught up with his fist, and Harry let him have it. Draco followed him as he fell backward into the edge of the kitchen’s dining table, which they did not eat at, because Draco insisted snottily that they were not servants.

Really, the truth was that Draco was a spoilt, rich arsehole, and pathetic, too, since he had no idea how to physically fight. He had scholar’s wrists, which was to say he read books and held wands and disdained Quidditch because he could not admit that next to Harry he was second best. Harry had had his growth spurt earlier and he was taller, and better built, and anyway he’d had an entire childhood of punching, kicking, fighting to hurt — he knew how it was done. He let Draco get close and twisted away, and since Draco’s stance was wide open actually did drive his elbow into Draco’s stomach. Then he took off his glasses and waited. Draco didn’t take long; he charged as soon as he had taken two deep breaths and forced Harry again back to the table, kicking at his feet.

Harry went down without resistance. Draco sat on his chest and punched him twice more, then, as Harry moved to dislodge him, beat his closed fist on Harry’s chest, one two three four five, each impact weaker than the last.

With a grunt Harry shifted their position sideways and knocked Draco’s head hard on the corner of a table leg. Then he did it again because he could.

There was a drop of blood, dark and reflective on the tile. Harry brought his hand to his face; his nose stung. He could feel his magic, buzzing beneath his skin.

Draco’s eyes were closed. He was folding in on himself in pain.

Harry stood up, wincing, and went to get his wand to repair the bowl. As he picked it up Draco said from the ground, “Don’t. I’ll do it.”

“Fine,” Harry said. He put the wand back down and left.

***

He took some towels from one of the bathrooms for his nose and went outside to sit on the cliff’s edge and watch the sea birds. There didn’t seem to be that many — or rather, it was difficult to tell their precise number when he didn’t have his glasses. The sun hammered on his brow. Everything else hammered on his heart.

Draco’s voice was coming from the sitting room when he went back inside. He paused in the hallway.

“— of it that way.”

“Of course not,” said Walburga’s portrait. The rendition of her here had brighter lighting and more vibrant colours; it was set on a path leading up to the house in summer, the wild grass rampant and overgrown, viridescent against a low thick sweep of cumulus clouds on the horizon; above it all hung a rich blue sky. “I would not expect it. You’re far too young.”

“I know about obligation and duty.”

“I did not mean to imply that you didn’t.”

“Great Aunt Wally,” Draco said, and he sounded so exhausted, “what if I can’t? What if I simply cannot?”

“Then we end,” replied Walburga.

Harry continued on upstairs.

***

Draco had dinner laid out on the low oval tea table by the window seat when Harry returned from the observatory.

He looked up from his book, eyes narrowed, and said imperiously, “Sit down at once.” He had Harry’s wand.

Harry sat on the bed. Draco healed his face — he did a better job than Harry had managed back in December — then undid the clasp at Harry’s throat.

“What are you doing?” Harry asked, leaning away slightly.

“Taking off your robes,” Draco explained impatiently. “I didn’t only hit you on your face.”

“You hit with about as much force as an undercooked pudding,” Harry said irritably. “I’m fine.”

But Draco refused to see reason, and then it turned out Harry did have bruises on his lower back from the table, so Draco healed that too.

Harry shrugged his outer robe back on. “What about you, then?”

“Took care of it,” Draco said, standing up. “Go have a bath.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, Malfoy.” Harry went.

He took his time, savouring every minute, deliberately thinking only about how comfortable it was, how hot the water was, how good it felt, and not about — anything irrelevant.

Infuriatingly, Draco was still waiting for him to eat dinner together when he got out. The carbonara was steaming as though it had been freshly plated. His mouth watered.

They ate silently; Harry finished his serving in what felt like three bites. Draco’s mouth tilted in the suggestion of a smirk, but he still didn’t say anything, just Summoned seconds.

Only when they were both full and the plates returned to the kitchen (Draco tapped the wand on the table and the house obliged them) did he speak. He said, “If you ever wanted to stop, I would understand.”

“Stop what,” Harry said flatly.

Draco made a gesture at the space between them. “This.”

As if Harry knew what _this_ was; were they friends? Housemates? Family? Or —

“I realise that we’re not that — compatible,” Draco went on, his voice conversational but his pose loudly unhappy.

“So …” Harry peered at him disbelievingly. “If I said, right, that’s it then, you can fuck right off, you’d just — do it? That’s what you’re saying? Because we had a fight —“

“This isn’t about the fight,” Draco said quickly. “Don’t pretend it is.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“I mean that,” Draco paused. “I mean —“ He cut himself off.

So they still were not going to talk about it.

“I’ve never known you to be so altruistic,” Harry noted sarcastically.

“Oh, don’t misinterpret me, Potter,” Draco rejoined harshly. “If you broke off with me I would resent you until the end of my days, and my resentment will manifest very creatively, you can be sure of that.”

Settling back, Harry stared at him.

Draco weathered it for a long moment, then shifted and bit out, “What.”

“You said we’re incompatible,” Harry said. “You’re a filthy liar, Malfoy. You don’t think that at all. You know it isn’t true.” At this, Draco opened his mouth but Harry kept going. “We’re not stopping. I refuse. Don’t give me that saintlike ‘_I’ll understand_‘ bullshit.”

Draco looked extremely insulted. “I was only trying to be considerate.”

“Yeah, well. I preferred it when you punched me in the face.” Harry stood up. “Come on; I’m tired.”

***

They interred Lucius and cremated Sirius on Thursday.

Neither event could be described accurately as a funeral; there wasn’t anything like the proceedings that had been held for Arthur Weasley. The Malfoy mausoleum was located in a forest clearing hidden within the extensive Wiltshire grounds; it could only be found by blood. Without Draco, they — Harry, Andromeda, four members of the Order on guard duty — would have wandered in circles for hours, fruitlessly.

Before the entrance was a stone archway partially overgrown with creeping ivy; atop it was draped a statue of a — Harry wasn’t quite sure. A serpentine dragon, maybe. It had wings, but its body was long and sinuous, twisting in on itself in complex figure eights, and it was eating its own tail, moving continuously while it did so, so that one moment its stone eye stared down at them and the next it was just a pattern of scales.

“It’s an ouroboros,” explained Lupin in a low voice. “It represents cyclicality. To pass under its watch means a return to what was, and what will be. It means a return to pure magic.”

Lucius’ coffin, closed and heavy, paused of its own accord in front of the arch. It was, evidently, being examined by the ouroboros, because after a minute or so Harry felt a chill wind, and then the coffin was floating through the arch to the entrance proper, disappearing into the thick darkness as though consumed.

Draco bowed formally to the ouroboros, a hand to his heart. Then he stepped deliberately around the arch, not through it, and followed.

They waited outside for his return. Tonks chatted quietly with the two Order members Harry did not know, an incredibly tall witch with short black hair and thick, solemn eyebrows, and a wizard nearly her same height with a scar through his right eye; from what Harry could overhear, they also seemed to be Aurors.

Lupin lectured more on the ouroboros gatekeeper and its iterations across traditional pureblood gravesites. Harry, not feeling loquacious, only listened and nodded. Andromeda, too, said very little. Eventually, Lupin exhausted the topic and they drifted into silence.

It took over an hour; Draco emerged white, tense and thin-lipped, gaze trained rigidly ahead as though terrified of meeting anyone’s eyes. He didn’t say anything about checking on the Manor, so they left the grounds immediately via apparition. Harry felt a curious sensation when they did so, as if the weak, frayed edges of the wards were brushing over his body.

Sirius could not be placed in the Black mausoleum, as he had been struck from the family tree. It was not his wish, anyway; even though he had not left precise instructions, he had been clear on _that_, Lupin told them. They set him alight in the garden of the Tonks house, and as he burnt Andromeda propelled him higher and higher, so that in the end it really did seem as though he had become a star.

“Cissy should have been here, but this could not wait,” she said forlornly to Harry, outside of Draco’s hearing, after it was done.

She took some of the ashes to spread in the garden, and gave the rest to him.

“Draco takes after his mother,” she said as she handed the urn over.

Harry was surprised. “Does he?”

Andromeda raised a shoulder. “He will not speak to me.”

Draco had, in fact, been paying close attention to her every word since the day had begun, but he had held himself stiffly and not engaged in any conversation; seen without insight, it could be interpreted as cold dislike. “He’s nervous,” Harry told her.

“Is he?” Andromeda sounded unconvinced.

“He doesn’t know you,” Harry explained apologetically, and left her looking troubled.

Draco had not told anyone else about Ursa-at-Sea, so Lupin and Tonks could not return them there directly under the Fidelius, but Harry had written them a description of the surrounding cliffside. It was safe enough.

“We’ll be here again on Sunday morning to collect you,” Lupin said as they landed on Arcturus Way. “Don’t forget.”

“Do you want to…?” Harry held the urn awkwardly forward.

Lupin faced away. “No, thank you, Harry. I’ll see Padfoot off in my own way.”

“Wotcha, cousin,” Tonks said to Draco. Her hair was back in platinum blonde.

The two of them disapparated with pops that were almost inaudible below the roar of the ocean. Draco muttered, “What cheer, indeed.”

He found brooms in storage and together they flew over the frothing waves and scattered the rest of Sirius’ ashes — save for a small portion Harry wanted to keep for Grimmauld Place. He could not help but think of how Sirius had been, when they had found the courtyard, and the blanket of ginkgo, golden like the lion of Gryffindor. Maybe there wasn’t a reason to persuade the courtyard back into synchronisation with the rest of the house, after all.

The brooms were of an old make: they turned ponderously and could not go at any definition of fast, but they held unexpectedly well against the strong winds, so once Harry and Draco were done with the ashes they kept flying for a while longer as dusk descended.

Preoccupied with the image of the sinking sun, Harry burnt dinner. Draco didn’t even seem to notice.

***

“You need a new wand,” Harry said on Saturday, marching into the sitting room.

Walburga’s portrait was empty. Draco was sitting, elbow on the arm of his chair, eyes half-closed.

There had been no sign of the hawthorn wand after Thursday; Harry assumed that it had been buried with Lucius in lieu of Lucius’ own wand, which Andromeda had not been able to find. The idea of Draco’s wand smothered in a tomb made Harry itchingly uncomfortable; even though that same wand had obeyed Lucius and tried to kill him, a wand was like a limb: it was as if a part of Draco himself were down there — but there was nothing to be done.

Draco took ages to reply. “I’ll discuss it with Mother when she wakes.”

“She won’t for another week. We’re going back to Hogwarts tomorrow.” Harry sat down next to him. “Can’t we ask Lupin to take you to Ollivander’s?”

With a sigh Draco turned to him. “Harry, I don’t have access to the vaults. I spent a good deal at Hogsmeade, and Father —“ he stopped, breathed, tried again — “was not giving me a consistent allowance. And I don’t know if he would have —“ he stopped again — “never mind. I expect I’ll need to visit Gringotts with Mother and speak to the goblins in person.”

“I can pay for it,” Harry said.

An odd expression came over Draco’s face, as though instead of offering help Harry had pulled the seat out from under him. He said, “Traditionally, a wand is gifted from parent to child.”

“Hagrid took me to get my wand,” Harry informed him. “Though it was paid for it out of the Potter vaults.”

“It’s symbolic,” Draco went on, sounding lost.

“Look,” Harry said, “I’ve got money I won from the Tournament, still. Plenty of it. You helped me with that, so let’s say you earned some of it, too. Then it’d be like — you gifting yourself. That should be fine, right? I mean, your parents already gifted you a wand once, so er, the symbolism or whatever’s already happened, hasn’t it?”

Draco frowned.

“Or, I guess,” Harry allowed, leaning back, “you can share mine until your mother wakes. If you’d rather.”

It didn’t seem like he’d been at all persuasive, but the next morning Draco asked Lupin and Tonks with exceeding politeness if he might trouble them to take a detour to Diagon Alley. They were visibly startled; apparently, they hadn’t even known that he was wandless, and agreed posthaste.

Luckily, Ollivander himself was attending the store, where the shelves were as stuffed full of wands as Harry remembered, though with the angle of the sun it was better lit and consequently slightly less mysterious.

The same could not be said for Ollivander; his eyes grew shrewd when he learnt that it was Draco who was his client. “Yes, I see,” he said. “Unicorn hair, ten inches, hawthorn, contradictions.” He vanished into the aisles, but his voice floated back: “Unicorn hair can perish when misused. That wand must have suffered sorrow …”

Draco tested wand after wand. It took a great deal of time. Other customers came in and were served by Ollivander’s wandkeepers, and they were all done in half an hour or less, while the pile of boxes of rejected wands beside Draco only grew. Eventually, Tonks left to buy lunch.

“Ten and a half inches, ash. Resilient. Dragon heartstring,” Ollivander pronounced as Harry stood to the side and ate.

Draco waved the wand. It gave a trail of sparks — it was the first one to do so, and Harry started forward — but then Draco’s arm jolted, as if it had been hit by a Stinging Hex, and the wand clattered to the floor.

“Ah!” Ollivander exclaimed excitedly. He hurried back into the shelves.

Draco picked the wand back up gingerly and placed it into its box. Harry offered him a chip.

Ollivander’s voice preceded him as he returned. “… do not work with reed, but we will have to see … you didn’t quite take to the ash, no … yes, I think this will do nicely.” He rounded the corner. “Twelve inches, acacia. Durable. Extremely selective. Dragon heartstring again.”

A shower of brilliant, finely dusted silver sparks blossomed as Draco flicked the wand through the air. He cast, “_Multicorfors_,” and Harry’s outer robes transformed from matte black to royal blue, the collar switching to a wider cut.

“Oi,” Harry said, but he grinned.

“Interesting,” Ollivander remarked. “How interesting …”

“What is?” Harry asked, wondering if Ollivander ever sold a wand without playing it up.

“Acacia wands are difficult to match,” Ollivander replied. “I don’t carry much of it, much less with dragon heartstring … that’s another contradiction … yes, fascinating.” He scrutinised Draco; Draco took a step back, glancing at Harry. Ollivander said again, “Yes, I see …”

“Er,” Harry said. “Okay. Thank you for your time. Shall we, um, pay at the counter?”

Later, as they walked up to Hogwarts from Hogsmeade, Draco admitted quietly, “Father was the one who took me, the first time.”

Harry didn’t doubt it. He let the statement hang between them for a few seconds, then asked, “How is it?”

Draco, who had been performing little spells continuously, answered, “Different.”

“Different how?”

“Hm,” was all Draco said. He offered the wand to Harry.

Harry sent him a questioning look, then glanced behind them. Lupin and Tonks were a few paces away, conversing with their heads bent toward each other. Harry took the wand carefully. It felt warm in his hand, but it might have just been the lingering heat from Draco’s grip.

“Cast something,” Draco said.

They were no strangers to borrowing each other’s wands — especially given the past week — but it was still a peculiar sensation to be proactively given a wand that was not his and told to use it.

“Er. _Colovaria_.” It wasn’t the same spell Draco had used earlier, but it did the job in returning Harry’s robes to their original colour. The widened collar remained, of course.

Draco took the wand back, humming thoughtfully.

“Is it not good?” Harry prodded.

“No,” Draco said decisively. “I like it.”


	13. Chapter 13

Pansy was incandescent. “Neither of you thought to owl? Do you know what the papers have been saying? Do you know what _I’ve_ been saying?”

“Er,” Harry supplied. “What have you been saying?”

“Nothing, that’s what,” Pansy said wrathfully. Harry winced.

“What have the papers been saying?” asked Draco, lounging back in the sofa and studiously ignoring the whispers travelling through the common room.

Pansy told them. The more reasonable stories ranged from ones detailing abrupt expulsion to abduction to running away to France due to OWL-induced stress. The less reasonable ones made many far-reaching and upsetting speculations about things like Harry’s financial situation, his moral boundaries and whether or not he had been secretly brewing a potion with Draco Malfoy to turn all of Europe’s population into sea horses.

“Oh, and also,” Pansy added, sounding far more relaxed now that she had had her rant, “the _Quibbler_ has published several updates on your elopement, but don’t worry, hardly anyone believes those. It’s the _Quibbler_, after all.”

Harry rubbed at this temples. “Right.”

Leaning in closer, growing serious, Pansy asked, “What really happened? I heard from — well, you know. Theo to begin with, and then Rosier kept hinting that she knew something … but no one’s clear on the details.”

Draco looked a request at him. Harry made a face.

“I heard,” Pansy said, hesitant, “that it was to do with — the Manor.”

“I’m going to the library,” Draco announced, getting up. “I’m one week behind on homework.”

They watched him leave. As the wall slid shut, Harry said, “Lucius died.” Then he told her what had happened. The image he painted was brief, only the scaffolding; she didn’t need to know about Sirius, for example, and anyway he didn’t want to talk about _that_, so — he didn’t elaborate.

Pansy’s face went through a number of emotions while he talked, but when he was done she had the bunkered-down posture of someone who was bracing for a blow. She murmured, “When this gets out, it will hurt Draco.” She glanced at him and clarified, “I mean that — it might make his name seem weak, to some people.”

“Or they might realise he’s the sole heir to the Malfoy fortune and that he’s coming into his own,” Harry said, feeling all of a sudden too old for the typical rhythms of school politics, which seemed cushioned and soft compared to the real thing, where being touched by the barest edge of a green beam of light meant instant death.

“That’s true,” Pansy agreed assessingly.

“The war really is here, Pans.” Harry reached across and gripped her hand.

Expression troubled, she kissed him lightly on the corner of his mouth. When she leaned back, she had composed herself. She said, “We’d better not lose, then.”

***

At the library, Draco was terrorising a group of third-years.

“Five points from Ravenclaw for disturbing the peace,” he said as Harry strode to the table he had requisitioned. “You’re a disgrace to your House.”

One of the Ravenclaws caught sight of Harry. She pointed enthusiastically and the rest of them turned as well, goggling. Harry distinctly heard the words ‘rebellion’, ‘_Quibbler_‘ and ‘marriage’.

“_Ten_ points from Ravenclaw,” Draco hissed vengefully. “And ten more for every minute you occupy space within my field of vision.” The Ravenclaws gaped at him. “Well? That was your invitation to _be gone_.”

They were intimidated enough to leave, but not so cowed as to not giggle and whisper while doing so. Harry flattened himself against the bookshelf to let them pass, suffering their not-so-covert glances as they squeezed by.

“Here,” Draco said shortly as he sat down, flicking over a piece of folded parchment. “She couldn’t stay because Gryffindor lost to Hufflepuff and Weasley is threatening to abscond to the Himalayas, or something atrocious like that.”

It was a note with Hermione’s handwriting. It read, _Harry, the password is ‘memoria teneo’_.

He showed Draco, who wrinkled his nose and said, “Ew.”

“Guess I’ll go before dinner. Want to come with?”

“I’d much rather be eaten alive by a Blast-Ended Skrewt,” Draco said. “No, thank you, Potter. If you want to get mauled by Gryffindors on their home ground, you’re on your own.” He made an impatient tapping motion on the desk. “Did you bring your Charms textbook?”

They worked together for a couple of hours in relative silence, as though nothing had changed — to be fair, very little had, when it came to school, when it came to classes, except that Harry felt less and less like he was studying for his OWLs and more like he was studying for his own survival.

An hour before dinner he left apprehensively for Gryffindor Tower. The Fat Lady eyed his Slytherin crest meaningfully after he recited the password, taking just a little too long to open. Harry fought the urge to tell her that the Slytherin wall was never this judgemental, but then again, it was hard for something which did not have eyeballs in the first place to compete with something that did. For all he knew, the Slytherin wall was sentient enough to judge everyone all the time.

“Harry!” Hermione exclaimed as soon as he stepped through. She ran over and engulfed him in a cloud of her hair.

“Hi, Hermione,” he replied, hugging her back. “It’s very, um, red in here.”

“Excuse you,” said Ron miserably by the fire.

“I meant the upholstery,” Harry clarified.

“Don’t mind Ron,” Hermione said.

“Yeah,” Ron agreed forlornly. “Just pretend I don’t exist. It’s not like it makes a difference, does it? The Quaffle certainly didn’t give a damn.”

“Er,” Harry said unhelpfully, following Hermione over, giving a little wave to a group of second or third-year students who were staring at him. A few of them blanched. “There’s always next match, right?”

“Ravenclaw beat Hufflepuff, so we’ll be in last place either way unless you lot win heavily in March,” Ron said. “Which you might, I suppose.” Flatly: “Hooray.”

“You just need to be more confident,” Hermione said placatingly.

Ron sighed, long and deflated. “I suppose it doesn’t really matter. It’s just Quidditch. Fred and George don’t seem to care as much either, now.”

Worry was in the line of Hermione’s mouth, but she only turned to Harry and asked, “What happened, Harry? Are you okay? We heard from —“ she lowered her voice further — “the Order, but only that you were at a safehouse for a week, and that — about Sirius.”

He didn’t want to go over it all again, but they deserved to know, so he did, omitting all the unnecessary details. Except for one. At the end, he added, staring down at the logs in the fire, crackling into ash, “Sirius got hit by the curse that was meant for me.”

“Oh, Harry,” Hermione said, and put an arm around his shoulder. She didn’t say anything banal but well-meaning like how it wasn’t his fault, and he wondered if it was because she’d had experience now, with Ron. The old Hermione would have said it. It was easier for him, though, that she didn’t.

Ron broke the brooding silence. “What now? Are people just going to keep dying, while the rest of the world pretends that everything is fine?”

“You can’t make people believe what they don’t want to,” Harry said.

“About that.” Hermione’s voice had that quality to it, the one that developed when she wanted to Take Initiative. “I’ve been thinking.”

***

There were several problems. The first was that while Rita Skeeter had not been writing actual defamatory articles about Harry, she had not precisely been holding off on making conspiratorial mentions to his ‘mysterious’ disappearance either. The second was that Harry was not sure just how candidly he _could_ talk about events transpired, especially now that Lucius Malfoy was dead. The third was that they could not agree on which publication to run the article in.

“You can’t use the _Quibbler_,” Harry argued. “According to it, Malfoy and I were ‘wed in secret’ and are expecting our firstborn in December.”

“Luna’s a lovely girl,” Hermione said. “Just … unique. You’ll like her. We can trust her.”

“Yes, but.” On this Harry would not budge, not least because he did not have a clue who Luna was. “No.”

“The _Daily Prophet_‘s full of lies, Harry.”

“Like, for instance, that I’m naming my kid Aquila?”

“Aquila’s a wonderful name,” Hermione said, tilting her head thoughtfully. “Significant, too: isn’t that the bird which transports Jupiter’s thunderbolts?”

“That’s not the point!” Harry told her with feeling.

Quizzically, Hermione asked, “You don’t mind giving the story to the _Prophet_?”

Harry rolled his eyes. “They’ve been dying to get an exclusive interview that’s actually an interview with me for years. I’m the Boy Who Lived. If they won’t print it how I tell them to, they’ll hear from my solicitors. Or Draco’s solicitors. Whichever. I’m sure he has them.”

“Sometimes,” Hermione remarked reprovingly, “I think you let Malfoy influence you a bit too much.”

Harry didn’t know what she was talking about; it wasn’t like it had been Draco’s idea — in fact, it was _her_ idea. Anyway, once he had explained the rationale to Draco, Draco had agreed with him. It was better to print it in the _Prophet_, and have a word with the Editor-in-Chief to make sure all the wrinkles were charmed out before everything went to press.

“And also,” Draco added, subdued. “I need to make a statement about — about Father. It can’t be left for much longer.”

A week later, Narcissa woke. Draco left midway through Friday and was gone for the whole of Saturday, and when he came back late that evening he told Harry, “I’ve owled Skeeter and booked us for tomorrow. Mother will be there.”

Rita Skeeter was as eclectically put-together as ever when she met their party — Harry, Draco, Narcissa, Hermione and Ron — at a private room in the Three Broomsticks. She handed her fox-fur cloak to the hook behind the door (which Vanished it) and greeted them all with a wide smile which was not at all fake; her hunger for the story was quite sincere.

“A pleasure,” she breathed, all teeth and painted red lips. “Cuffe has agreed: front page feature, multiple parts. Harry’s will be centrepiece.”

“Rita,” Narcissa said. She was thinner, but otherwise looked well. Every part of her from the long straight hair to the pale blue eyes seemed as dangerous and as unforgiving as it always had, secured beneath a veneer of calm, even though she had spent half a month unconscious, even though her husband was dead. “It’s been some time.”

“Mrs Malfoy,” Skeeter replied. “Narcissa. It has.”

“Draco tells me there are some issues.” Narcissa lifted an eyebrow. “Are there?”

“It depends on the angle you want to run.” A menu appeared at the table; Rita ordered an Everlasting Espresso. “Public opinion is all over the place right now. You can gather it up and tip it in any direction with the right amount of force. But …” She slanted a meaningful look over her glasses.

Narcissa sounded bored. “That’s a small matter. The important thing is that we run the correct narrative.”

“So you’ll…?” Skeeter said.

“Do you still remember,” Narcissa said slowly, “what I told you in ‘79?”

Skeeter’s skin turned a shade whiter under the applied blush. “Of course.”

“Then I have some errands that require my attention,” Narcissa finished. “Draco will handle the rest. Good day.” She stood up, touched her hand lightly to Draco’s shoulder, nodded at Harry and glided out of the room as though Hermione and Ron did not exist.

“Wow,” Ron said under his breath. It wasn’t obvious whether he was impressed or disgusted. Hermione shushed him.

Rita was watching like a hawk. Draco ignored Ron and said, “Harry will speak to you first about what happened last year. That will be followed by a short session with Weasley, and then finally myself.” He added, “Naturally, my session will be conducted in private.”

“Tell me,” Rita said, leaning on the table, “I’ve always wondered — how did the two of you become such close friends? The Boy Who Lived and the son of Lucius Malfoy?”

“This isn’t about personal matters,” Hermione said quickly.

“On the contrary,” Draco said smoothly. “This time, I would love to tell you all about it.”

The crocodile-skin purse snapped open and Rita took out her quill. She smiled again. “Then let’s begin.”

***

The article was titled, dramatically, _HARRY POTTER WARNS OF WAR_, with the subsections headed, _YOUNGEST SON OF WEASLEY MOURNS DAD_ and _MALFOY HEIR ON THE RISE_. Draco’s interview was twice as long as Ron’s, and in it Lucius Malfoy was unrecognisable as a singularly strict but kind father, fighting honourably against the hold of Imperius once more to protect his wife and only son. There were no mentions of anyone’s views on Muggles or Muggleborn, only the unsubtle implication that Voldemort had made an unpardonable mistake. At the very end, there was a compact but poignant paragraph about Draco and Harry’s fated (Rita’s words) meeting in Madam Malkin’s, where they had instantly taken a liking to each other (untrue). _Harry and I absolutely have our differences_, Draco was quoted saying, _but we trust each other enough to overcome them, and we are of the firm belief that unity is the way forward_.

Harry could feel Draco staring at him warily as he read the advance copy they had been owled.

“You do realise,” Harry said, folding the paper up, “that you’ve just publically declared your allegiance.”

They were back in their alcove. Far below them, early morning fog was rising over the Forbidden Forest. Occasionally, a Thestral flew up above it, then dipped back down.

Draco took the paper from him and put it away. “Obviously. It had to be done.”

“There were a lot of omissions,” Harry observed.

“You were there when we agreed on them,” Draco replied, keeping his voice low. “You can’t talk about Greg or Vincent or Theo’s fathers, do you know what it would do to them? It can only go badly. Greg doesn’t even know the first thing about politics.”

“It’s war, not politics.”

“War _is_ politics when people stop talking.”

Sighing, Harry said, “It’s not that, anyway. I just meant — will this convince anyone?”

“I think it’s a good place to start,” Draco responded resolutely.

“Maybe,” Harry said, thinking aloud, “I should have mentioned the prophecy.”

There was a ringing silence.

“The prophecy,” Draco said, in the tones of someone who really did not want to know.

“Oh.” Harry ran a hand through his hair and stifled a yawn. “I forgot to tell you. Actually I sort of forgot completely, since. You know.” He told Draco about going to the Department of Mysteries with Dumbledore, and then recited the prophecy, which, surprisingly, he was able to recall word for word. He supposed it had been there, stuck in his subconscious, ever since Valentine’s Day.

“Okay.” Draco put his hand to his temple. “No. First of all, you should not have mentioned the prophecy, especially if the Dark Lord was after it. Death Eaters can read the paper, too, you know. That’s one catastrophe averted, at least. Secondly, Potter, what the fuck.”

“What?” Harry asked, frowning. “You knew about it already.”

“I didn’t know what it was about. It’s a _prophecy_,” Draco said significantly, as though Harry had just declared that the apocalypse was nigh. “There’s a _prophecy_, specifically about you and the Dark Lord, of course there is, of course you have to be the one who —“ he stopped, looking, all at once, like he was on the verge of panic. “Why are you taking this so calmly?”

“I don’t know,” Harry answered honestly. “I suppose I haven’t really had time to think about it yet. And it seems — kind of inevitable, don’t you think? Given everything that’s happened.”

“Oh, yes, because it’s all very —“ Draco put his hands up in the air.

“Well it’s backwards, isn’t it? All of this has happened because of the prophecy, and so now that it’s happened it doesn’t really matter if the prophecy exists, it’s already — Voldemort isn’t going to stop.”

“Right,” Draco said, his enunciation crisp and joyless.

Harry needed to know: “Does this change anything?”

“Potter, it’s a _prophecy_ —“

“I mean between us.”

Draco looked at him with annoyance. “Why would it? It just means it’s going to be more challenging than I thought, that’s all.”

***

Umbridge, who had been solidifying her power base in Hogwarts with her creepily cheerful smile and fluffy pink robes, did not approve of the triple feature in the _Prophet_. She called Harry and Draco to her office and informed Harry that he was suspended from the Quidditch team.

“But Professor,” Draco cajoled, “the next match is this Sunday. Slytherin is on track to win the Quidditch Cup _and_ the House Cup. _You_ were in Slytherin. You know how important this is.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “And — I shouldn’t be telling you this, but I believe in your utter discretion — my mother wrote to me this morning and said she had been lunching with Minister Fudge, and he’d been telling her how trustworthy you were, how you could be counted on to do the right thing. Mother said that if I had any problems I should come to _you_ directly.”

Umbridge’s mouth had formed a little ‘o’ on top of the rim of her teacup. She set it down with a dainty clink and said primly, “Of course the Minister trusts me. Why, he affords me every confidence —“

“Exactly,” Draco said, beaming. “Which is why you have this post.”

Harry could see Umbridge thinking fast — if Fudge was allowing the article, if Fudge was dining with Narcissa Malfoy — and in the next moment Draco had her. She coughed her high-pitched cough. “I do suppose Mr Potter has behaved well in class thus far, and of course you have been most exceptional, Mr Malfoy. But as I have already punished Mr Weasley, I’ll have to be fair. Shall we say … five points from Slytherin between the two of you? That will do.”

They were dismissed, Draco dripping with smugness.

Ron was not so pleased when Harry saw him later in Care of Magical Creatures. “_Five_ points? Five?!” he shrieked. “_I_ was suspended from playing Quidditch, _and_ I got detention. Do you know what that bitch has people doing in detention?”

Harry hadn’t been aware. The new knowledge made him somewhat nauseous.

“Well no one wants you to be suspended, too, Harry,” Hermione said in response to his troubled confession of guilt. “It’s just that — I mean — it’s a very Slytherin thing to do, isn’t it? Worm your way out of things.”

And what was Harry supposed to say to that? He _was_ a Slytherin, and if he could have gotten Ron out of the suspension and the detention he would have. What did Hermione expect him to do, what did she want him to be? _He_ wanted to be useful, _he_ wanted to be _doing_ something, and suffering in solidarity was not productive, even if it built camaraderie; in that, at least, Draco was right.

The interview circulated like wildfire, so much so that it was rumoured people had begun charming duplicates and selling them illegally for five knuts a pop. Riding the wave of demand, the _Prophet_ reprinted a lengthier version of the feature in a special edition of their _Sunday_ issue that same week, covered with a photo of Harry and Draco walking together in a side street in Hogsmeade. The photo was designed to look almost candid, but it wasn’t: Rita had asked for it to be taken, and Draco hadn’t objected, so Harry had acceded.

“So that’s what that was for,” Harry said, when he first saw the cover.

“What’d you think it was for?” scoffed Draco.

“You knew it was going to be reprinted in the _Sunday Prophet_?”

“Potter, grabbing enough attention to be reprinted in the _Sunday Prophet_ was the whole point.” Draco did not appear to be feigning his confusion.

“Oh.” Harry watched as his photograph self made a passionate gesture, mouth moving silently, and the photograph Draco smirked back. Even in ink, the smirk looked incredibly fond.

“Have you read the op-ed by Braithwaite?”

The op-ed by Braithwaite was, on the whole, positive. Braithwaite was operating on the belief that Harry Potter was not a liar, which was more than Harry could say for about half the school. While the general mood seemed to be shifting, far too many people were convinced that he’d done the interview exclusively as a media ploy to increase his own standing and fame, which he didn’t even feel good about denying because several factors _had_ been orchestrated, even if the goal hadn’t precisely been fame.

At least there were more facts mixed in with the rumours, now.

He tried to focus less on public opinion and more on what he could accomplish in the moment. He caught the Snitch and Slytherin won the match against Ravenclaw, 240 to 80. He also caught up on his homework, and began again to feverishly and systematically go through books of spells that might be useful in wartime with Draco. The two of them continued their Occlumency sessions with Snape. He recommenced his study sessions with the Slytherins.

Daphne’s Patronus did actually turn out to be a bear (a polar bear, in fact, although Harry hadn’t been able to immediately discern the subspecies himself, due to lack of colouring). He suspected that they had all been secretly practising during his absence; Pansy was now capable of producing a strong silver glow, but she seemed too hung up on the form she wanted her Patronus to take to allow it to actually manifest.

“Focus on your happy memory instead,” Harry told her. “It’ll be what it’ll be.”

“I am,” she responded. “But it’ll be a thresher shark.”

Even Greg was managing to produce weak but consistent results. He and Vincent seemed to have made a competition out of it, egged on by Blaise.

Draco was the only one who could not do it, at all.

Astoria, Harry could not help but notice, had not come. Afterward, instead of going to the Great Hall for lunch, the two of them made a quick trip to the kitchens and then trekked back up to the Room. This time, Draco did the pacing in front of the blank stretch of wall; when the door appeared, it opened to a miniature hilltop garden on a summer afternoon, a lovely big oak tree giving shade, a pleasant breeze blowing. There was a colourfully woven picnic blanket on the grass in the dappled light with empty plates and goblets, as if the Room knew that they had their own food.

Harry couldn’t not ask. He did so as soon as they had settled down.

“I broke up with her,” Draco said succinctly. “It wasn’t fair.”

He didn’t elaborate on what exactly it was that hadn’t been fair. Harry stifled his burning urge to pry deeper. They ate their sandwiches and pies and lay down. Harry burped; his eyelids were heavy.

“_Expecto Patronum_,” Draco cast, softly.

Nothing happened.

Draco said, “I can’t stop seeing it.”

“I know,” Harry murmured. Behind his eyelids, night after night, were two motionless bodies. He waved his wand. “_Expecto Patronum_.”

The stag trotted leisurely into being, lowering its head down to Harry’s face in a friendly manner, then bequeathed the same examination upon Draco. This done, it leapt a carefree lap around the tree, every movement the movement of a child discovering the world: innocent and unselfconscious.

“Are you just showing off now, Potter?” Draco asked, but without particular bitterness. He just sounded weary. “What was that for?”

“I can’t stop seeing it either,” Harry told him. “Maybe I got lucky; the sensation of a Patronus isn’t so easily forgettable. Maybe that’s why I can keep casting it.” They watched the stag wander downhill and nibble ineffectively on the grass. “But maybe not.” Harry turned to his side and faced Draco. “Try this: stop trying to not see it.”

Draco furrowed his brow. “And?”

“It’s there,” Harry tried to explain, “and it — hurts. Okay. Don’t focus on pushing it away. Let it stay, acknowledge it. Then put your focus on a happy memory. Do only that. A little like how you taught me about clearing my mind, with Occlumency. Only, er, different.”

“Only, er, different,” Draco repeated, a hint of laughter in his tone, like he was making fun of Harry’s bumbling explanation. But he closed his eyes, again bringing up his wand. He said nothing for many minutes. Harry waited patiently.

Finally: “_Expecto Patronum_.”

It wasn’t corporeal — far from it — but there was a definite misty glow, which was a vast improvement from nothing at all. Draco opened his eyes and flushed at the sight. Harry smiled broadly.

“Was it always like that for you?” Draco wondered. “Having to — know, and yet shift focus completely.”

“It’s like that for everyone, if there’s a Dementor nearby,” Harry answered. “I think.”

Draco cast it again and again; it worked each time, although it didn’t get stronger.

Harry caught himself almost dozing, and snapped back to wakefulness with a start. Reluctantly, he said, “We should probably go.”

“Yeah,” Draco agreed, heaving himself up and offering Harry a hand.

“Thanks.”

Draco turned away. “Astoria will probably come next Sunday.”

“Oh,” Harry said.

“I like her,” Draco said, walking down to the door which stood by itself, attached to nothing. “I intend to stay friends with her.”

“Okay.” Harry stuffed his hands into his pockets.

Slowly, Draco turned the handle. He had a concentrated expression on his face, as though he were considering his next words with care. But then he stepped back into the seventh floor corridor without saying anything at all. Harry followed, feeling inexplicably bereft, and as they shut the door he let the stag dissolve, its ghostly form merging with the sunlight Draco had summoned.

***

Harry dreamed:

Sirius was there in dog form, running round and round a circle of standing stones that had been carved with constellations, like the engraving above the door at Ursa-at-Sea. The surrounding field of grass was as endless as the ocean of stars above. Harry stepped up to a stone three times his height, touching his palm to its rough cool surface, and there on the other side was his mother.

She was young, as young as she had been in Priori Incantatem, because she had died when she was twenty-one. She regarded him with a smile, her long red hair pushed all over one shoulder.

“Talk to me, darling,” she said, speaking oddly, sounding like Narcissa.

They walked around the stones, and as they did so the circle grew wider; it seemed as though they would never reach the spot where they had begun. Harry told her about everything, unsequenced — the cupboard, how one time Dudley had tried to eat a crayon and then spat the mess on the wall and blamed him, how he had danced with Draco Malfoy at the Yule Ball, how he loved flying, how perhaps it should not have been Sirius who had died, how he sometimes woke up in the middle of the night, a jolt in the darkness, panicked at nothing. Through it all she just smiled the smile he had seen in the Mirror of Erised, the one that said he was safe and loved and accepted. Sirius ran at their heels, barking with abandon.

Harry stretched his gaze across the field. “Where’s Dad?”

“Your father is taking tea with the Minister,” Lily said. She inclined her head upward and pointed to the sky. “There’s Draco. See? You have to break the membrane.”

And it made sense, because he could see the light coming through the water, and now he was swimming, pushing at the current with all his might, because if he didn’t then it would be too late, it would be too late, too late, too late, too late.


	14. Chapter 14

Umbridge, blocked from doing anything much about the _Prophet_ interview, continued implacably on her rampage of power over everything else and sacked Trelawney. From all accounts it had been deserved, although Harry, having never attended a Divination class, wasn’t quite sure why. Wasn’t Trelawney a true Seer? Wasn’t she responsible for the prophecy that was now wrapped around his throat?

He didn’t like Umbridge, but she bothered the Slytherins a lot less than she bothered the other Houses, and Draco knew exactly how to play her, so on the whole he was able to ignore her. This wasn’t the case for Hermione, who was slowly being driven mad.

Hermione did not appreciate his cautious inquiry into her mental state. “She’s put Hagrid on _probation_,” she said furiously. “And he’s been holding proper lessons ever since he got back!”

“Are you actually grinding your teeth?”

“OWLs!” Hermione declared, less like she was trying to articulate anything and more like she was providing punctuation. She put her head in her hands and exhaled.

“We’ve still got about three months.”

There was a muffled noise like a kettle being brought to boil in a padded room. Luckily, they were sitting at the table furthest from Madam Pince.

He trod with exceptional care around her all throughout March, but despite his best efforts it still went disastrously downhill when some Ravenclaw — Marietta Edgecombe, whoever she was — betrayed Hermione’s vigilante group, which they’d named _Dumbledore’s Army_, because — why, Harry could not fathom — and somehow as a result Dumbledore himself became a fugitive.

To be honest, the explanation Hermione offered was a bit confusing.

“You what?” he said, frowning at her. “You cursed Edgecombe with a permanent scar on her _face_?”

“That’s not important,” Hermione snapped. “Now Umbridge is Headmistress, and it’s going to be bad, Harry — it’s —“

“You have the countercurse, though, right?”

“Are you listening to me?” Hermione actually stamped her foot. They were standing just outside the Great Hall; she had dragged him from his breakfast by the wrist. “Forget about Marietta, it was her own fault, she signed the contract, she knew —“

“She didn’t though,” Harry insisted doggedly. “It’s not like you told anyone when they were signing it.”

This reminder only incensed Hermione more. She drew away from him and crossed her arms. She had her wand in her right hand, he noticed. “What’s your problem, Harry? When Malfoy does something like — like a Slytherin, you’re all for it, but when I — you _know_ how important the DA was to me, you _know_ I couldn’t have just _let_ — god.” She breathed out forcefully. “We were doing so well, and now Umbridge has taken over, and …”

“It’ll be all right,” Harry tried to reassure her.

“Well of course it’ll be all right for _you_,” she responded, and there was a level of acid to her voice he hadn’t ever heard before. “She doesn’t touch Slytherins, does she?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Harry said, even though he knew exactly what it meant, even though it wasn’t strictly inaccurate.

“You don’t even know,” Hermione said rapidly, the words tumbling one after the other in a rush like a dam had broken, “how much Professor Dumbledore cares for all of us. He got sacked for _us_. He — you’re always talking about how you don’t quite trust him, but god, Harry, he trusts _you_, and you don’t even know it. You’re so —“

“So what?” Harry had to know.

Hermione squared her shoulders. “Sometimes I think I know you and sometimes I think I really don’t. You went and let Malfoy make the interview look like — like propaganda, and you look at him like he’s — like —“ she stopped, grimacing. “He’s not always right, Harry.”

A group of Hufflepuffs came out of the Hall, chattering and staring curiously. Harry waited for them to leave. He couldn’t believe — he said, “Don’t you think I _know_ that?”

“You don’t act like it.” She was pressing her lips together so hard her mouth was just a thin, almost bloodless line.

“You have no idea what we’re like around each other,” Harry told her, tone growing cold; he couldn’t help it.

“Oh, I’m sure it’s even worse than when you’re with me,” Hermione rejoined. “You’re always — it’s always Draco this and Draco that, like gospel.”

She was lying; he barely ever mentioned Draco when he was around her, and if he did then it was because there was no way to avoid it. If he did, it was only because Draco was — Draco was — “You know, Hermione, you’re not always right, either.”

For a moment Hermione looked too astonished for words, but then she burst out with, “For god’s sake, Harry, he’s _using_ you. His father died and the first thing he thought about was how to abuse your friendship with him to elevate his situation. Didn’t you read his interview? It was obvious. He’s — he’s a Slytherin, and —“

“He’s my _friend_,” Harry snarled.

“Of course he is,” Hermione said, and she was gaining confidence, drawing herself up, planting her feet in a wider stance, “but even if you think of him as a friend, and _he_ thinks of you as a friend — he does, it’s likely — you have to know that friendship probably means something different to him than it does to you, please, Harry, you have to see —“

“You told me he came to speak to you in second year, for me. You thought it was good for me to be friends with him —“

“I’ve never thought or said that it’s good that the two of you are friends,” Hermione revealed sharply. “I only knew that it was _bad_ for you to fall out with him; it was killing you. Everyone could see it. You never asked my explicit opinion about your relationship with him, and I thought it wasn’t my place to —“

“It _isn’t_,” Harry cut in.

“— give it. But let me be clear now: I worried all the time that he wasn’t — that maybe you would regret it. And just because he deigned to speak to me once in second year doesn’t mean he’s irrevocably redeemed forever; it absolutely doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be careful.” She presented her ace: “Lucius Malfoy was his father.”

She was angry, and she was frustrated, and stressed, and earnest. She cared so much about so many things. She thought she knew best. She _wanted_ the best for him.

He couldn’t bear to be in her presence for a second longer.

Before he went back into the Great Hall he turned just long enough to tell her umambiguously: “Draco’s interview — how it was structured, the way Skeeter conducted it, the things he said about the two of us — those were _my_ suggestions.”

***

Both of them stayed at Hogwarts over Easter; the exams were too close, and studying was easier managed with access to the school library. And, Harry suspected, Draco was putting off spending a holiday with only his mother and without the Manor, his father a permanent absence at the dinner table.

With the exception of the Slytherins, who were indifferent, the student and teacher base in general reacted badly to Umbridge’s appointment as Headmistress; the students demonstrated this by chaotic rebellion, the teachers by their lack of remonstrance. As Hermione might have said, the overall effect was not conducive to a productive learning environment (Harry couldn’t confirm whether or not she actually thought this, because they weren’t speaking). It was a distraction, if not a necessarily welcome one, as meanwhile more and more disappearances occurred in the world outside.

Mostly, it was Ministry workers. Some of them turned up again within a week with unlikely stories about Firewhisky, and, in one case, career-ending associations with streetwalkers in Spain, but several of them did not.

“He doesn’t know that the prophecy was destroyed, then,” Harry concluded.

“Wouldn’t be difficult to Polyjuice as an Unspeakable and find out,” Draco countered. “If he doesn’t know, he will soon. And look — Bloomsaeth was definitely from the Department of Transport, it’s not some Unspeakable cover.”

“How do you know?”

It was likely that Draco knew because of Lucius, Harry realised a second too late, but Draco only said after a short pause, “He was reponsible for the Cloud Cover legislation of ‘72. Not to mention his recent push for lifting the ban on flying carpets.”

“Right. Of course. Silly me.”

“My point is, maybe the target isn’t the Department of Mysteries anymore.”

Soon enough it wasn’t just stories in the paper. At the end of Easter break two seventh-years and one sixth-year, all three in Slytherin, did not return. The atmosphere in the common room shifted; it was a little more guarded, everyone more careful about keeping their topics of conversation limited to schoolwork and frivolous things, at least when they could be overheard. Harry felt the press of eyes on the back of his neck more than ever.

If Snape noticed the changes in his students’ behaviour, he gave no sign of it. His face as he regarded Harry across from his desk during Careers Advice week was, as always, full of unprofessional dislike and the haughty suggestion that the plights of his fellow men were beneath him.

“So, Potter,” he drawled. “Pray tell of your future aspirations, if indeed you possess any whatsoever.”

Snape’s desk, if examined closely, was meticulously ordered, papers and files and ink bottles placed just so, and strange jars of potions ingredients labelled and no doubt sorted by how poisonous they were, or something. Except — and wasn’t this telling — at a cursory glance it appeared cluttered and cramped, like Snape had run out of room to place things on the shelves and had started piling them on every available surface because he couldn’t be bothered.

Maybe, Harry thought with a tinge of horror, the greasy hair was the same way; maybe Snape actually used a calculated series of products measured in exact quantities to achieve just the correct degree of lankness he preferred.

Realising that the silence was becoming prolonged, Harry said, “Er. Well — I’d like to survive the war.”

Snape sneered. “In that you are not unique. If you could not bother to even prepare for this appointment by reading the material provided, Potter, then at least spare me your self-glorification.”

“I don’t know what I want to be,” Harry told him in exasperation, then added belatedly, “Sir.”

“Then let us examine your marks,” Snape said, sounding like he would rather be doing anything else. He tapped his wand on a roll of parchment and it unwound itself in the air next to him; he regarded its contents with disdain. “You average between Acceptable and Exceeds Expectations in most of your subjects. You do not appear to demonstrate noteworthy aptitude for anything in particular.”

“Thanks,” Harry muttered sarcastically.

Snape let the parchment reroll itself with a snap. “Do you have any interests at all, Potter?”

“I like flying,” Harry said defensively.

“The life of a professional Quidditch player is rigorously demanding and requires, amongst other things, the sacrifice of a regular life schedule, as it involves a lot of travel. Although you may hope to be signed on because of your undeserved fame, I would advise you to reconsider if you mistakenly believe Quidditch to be an easy choice.”

“I didn’t mean — I just meant that I like flying, sir, not that I wanted to be a professional Quidditch player.” Harry scowled. “And anyway, I think I’m — what you said earlier — I’m not bad at Defence, am I?”

“Are you?” Snape questioned unhelpfully. “There is nothing concrete here to suggest proficiency, considering the subject’s consistent lack of reputable teachers.”

“I could — I could be an Auror,” Harry said in frustration, less because he actually wanted to and more to see Snape’s reaction.

“That would require a NEWT in Potions, Potter, and I do not regret to inform you that I only allow students who achieve an Outstanding in their Potions OWL into my advanced classes.”

The smugness in Snape’s voice was insufferable. Harry snapped, “I don’t see why I can’t get an Outstanding.”

Snape just looked at him like Harry had told a remarkably unfunny joke.

What would Draco say? “I think,” Harry told him, “that as an educator you’re supposed to be encouraging of your students. I’m not feeling very encouraged. Sir.”

“Neither am I,” Snape replied, lip curling. He went on, as Harry opened his mouth to object, “If you are truly interested in Aurorship I must recommend that you apply yourself in Transfiguration and Charms. The Auror course at the Ministry will only accept the best, and their final graduate list is extremely selective.”

“Great,” Harry said flatly.

“I must also inform you that Hogwarts offers a wider choice of electives beginning sixth year, as long as certain prerequisites are met.” Snape flicked his wand and several pamphlets from a pile floated over. “You will submit a list of your elective choices for consideration before the year ends.”

“Advanced Arithmancy,” Harry read. “Are these —“

Snape held up a stalling hand. “Ten minutes have passed, Potter. You’re dismissed.”

Snape was a terrible person who should have been sacked years ago or better yet never hired, Harry thought bitterly as he stomped out. He could bet fifty galleons that he would have had a more productive conversation with any other member of staff. Except for maybe Filch. _Hagrid_ probably could have given him better advice, if Hagrid weren’t so preoccupied with — whatever it was, he wouldn’t say. Actually, Harry was a bit worried about that.

Anyway, the point was that Snape, incapable himself of choosing a career he genuinely enjoyed, was not qualified to speak to impressionable students about their intimidatingly uncertain futures.

“Hm?” Draco hummed indistinctly from his horizontal position on the couch, glancing up from his book. “What?”

“Never mind,” Harry sighed.

“I think I’ll take Alchemy,” Draco said musingly. “Professor Snape said I’d probably enjoy it. What about you?”

“Alchemy,” Harry echoed, “like the Philosopher’s Stone?”

“To do with the transmutation of the elements, yes,” Draco said. “Some processes in potions making are already based on alchemic theory, as are some advanced forms of transfiguration, so I think it would be useful to learn.”

“What kind of career does alchemy lead to?” wondered Harry aloud.

Draco stared at him blankly. “An alchemist?”

“You want to be an alchemist? Where do they hire alchemists?”

“What, Potter? No.” Draco put his book down briefly. “It’s not like I’ll need to _work_.”

“So you’ll just … do what, exactly?”

“I’ll pursue my interests productively,” Draco said. “Obviously.”

“Right.”

“It’s not like you can’t do the same.”

Harry looked at him in shock. “I can?”

Rolling his eyes, Draco said, “You’re inheriting the Potter fortune, which isn’t insubstantial; that is to say, it’s not a massive estate, but it’s still old money, and it’s been accumulating for centuries. And — and my cousin has left you part of the Black estate.” He considered briefly and added, “If you don’t want the Black estate, by the way, you could give it to me. It shouldn’t really be divided the way it has been, and when it comes to entailment it makes just as much sense for me to inherit as it does for you. More, rather.”

It was easier then to snort and pretend that they weren’t referring so casually to Sirius’ death. Harry said, “Yeah right, Malfoy.”

But the idea of not being pushed into a career and being able to take his time with what he wanted was a tantalising one, and he mulled over it all night.

He just needed to figure out _what_ he wanted, that was all.

***

He saw glimpses of Hermione at mealtimes leading up to the OWLs; she turned up her nose every time she caught him. She must have been stressed — everyone was; in fact, he had already witnessed several episodes of hysterical Ravenclaw tears in the library, not to mention Greg walking into a wall while reciting plant names for Herbology. But he knew that Hermione’s drive for study and conviction in her own actions allowed her no room for misgivings, and she was an accomplished multitasker besides. She never sat down to eat without doing something else at the same time, such as reading a thick book, or practising wand movements, or, as Harry began to notice after a week or so, whispering into people’s ears, like she was planning something. Except it was implausible for her to willfully disrupt exams. It was more likely that he, Harry, was just being paranoid.

On the night of the Astronomy practical Hagrid was attacked — actually attacked, and had to run for it, and McGonagall was Stunned so badly she landed in St Mungo’s. The whispering became much more noticeable after that: it flowed up and down both the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables during breakfast the next day. Even half of Ravenclaw seemed to be in on whatever it was.

“Do you know what’s going on?” he asked Pansy.

“If the objective is to strictly de-escalate a situation according to Mayflower’s Principle, then what would be the best way to counter a bouncing hex?” she asked in return.

“Still _Salvio Hexia_, I think,” Harry said, and didn’t bother repeating his question; Pansy was already foraging in her bag, presumably for notes.

The following day was Draco’s birthday. “Happy birthday,” Harry said dutifully as they got up that morning.

“How so?” Draco replied grumpily.

“We just have Ancient Runes left,” Harry pointed out. “D’you want to go have lunch in the Room after?”

“Why not,” said Draco non-committally, floating the Syllabary in front of himself as he dressed.

The Ancient Runes exam didn’t go too badly, Harry thought; it could have been worse — at least the subject was more interesting than History of Magic, and he had to admit that since they had begun drawing up their own runic circles his memory of the core index had vastly improved. He was fairly confident that he’d managed an Acceptable.

“I think I failed,” Draco announced as they sat down beneath the oak tree.

As this was patently ludicrous, Harry ignored him. He plated three lemon tarts and handed them over instead.

“Why am I being given dessert,” Draco whinged woefully (Harry suspected, for the sole purpose of being annoying), “when we’re supposed to be having lunch?”

“You like them, you prat,” Harry told him. “It’s your birthday.”

Draco took a bite of one of the tarts. “I suppose it is.” For a moment he was sombre and pensive the way he had been at Ursa-at-Sea. Then he said, “If I don’t get an O I may as well have failed, is what I mean.”

“You sound like Hermione,” Harry remarked.

“I thought you weren’t talking to her.”

“I’m not.”

“Too bad,” Draco commented, already on to his second tart. “You could have pilfered her Runes notes.”

It wasn’t like Draco even needed Hermione’s Runes notes, Harry didn’t bother saying; they finished eating and lay down in mutual silence, letting the leaf-filtered light sift over their closed eyelids.

Of course, this was Hogwarts, and the peace couldn’t last.

They left the Room to discover that the upper corridors were all empty. Even the portraits were absent of life, save for a few horses and cows chewing on grass in idyllic British countrysides.

As they drew closer to the Entrance Hall, they began to hear a great deal of noise.

It was all indecipherable shouting until, unmistakably, Harry heard Umbridge’s voice saying shrilly, “Intolerable! Absolutely intolerable, Miss Granger, and I —“

“I repeat!” interrupted Hermione, who must have cast a variation of _Sonorus_ on herself, because although she was not shouting her words could be heard clearly. “I repeat! We are Students Against Corruption and Coercion, and these are a list of our demands.”

“‘Sacc’?” Draco murmured as the staircase turned and gave them a broad view of what must have been the entire student body and all of the teachers crammed into the relatively narrow space, some spilling out the front doors onto the steps and the courtyard. Even Peeves was there, bobbing in the air and watching with rapture.

Hermione was standing at the head of a large contingent of students, red and yellow and blue, all with their arms folded, reading from a scroll of parchment to Umbridge, who was backed up against the doors to the Great Hall.

“We demand to be treated fairly! The Ministry appointed High Inquisitor has displayed blatant favouritism in her treatment of students, which is behaviour unbefitting of someone in a position of authority at a place of education. We demand to be treated fairly!” Hermione raised her wand and shot up bright red sparks, which exploded like a small firework some distance above. This motion was copied by the students behind her, and the collective explosions sounded like a struck gong. “We demand justice for crimes committed! The Ministry appointed High Inquisitor has made use of Black Quills during her detention sessions, which is classified as cruel and unusual punishment of minors under section thirty-four point two of Highesner’s Law. We demand justice for crimes committed!” Another _gong_.

Umbridge’s face was pink enough to match her robes. Harry noticed that the examiners for the OWLs were there, too, watching with appalled expressions.

“We demand competence!” Hermione went on passionately. “The Ministry appointed High Inquisitor has allowed disruption and chaos to dominate Hogwarts since her forced appointment as Headmistress. She has declined to teach the necessary practical component of Defence Against the Dark Arts. She discourages curiosity. We are here to learn! We are here to grow! We demand competence! We are against corruption! We will not tolerate coercion! As such, our final demand is the reinstatement of Headmaster Albus Dumbledore, and we have pledged to not move from this Hall until our demands are met!” _Gong_.

“Hear, hear!” cried the Weasley twins loudly, and all of the protesting students pointed their wands to their feet as one and cast Sticking Charms.

***

By sundown a gaggle of reporters from various papers had gathered at the school gates, heedless of Umbridge’s increasingly desperate threats. By the next day, some of them had even advanced daringly into the school grounds, lead by Rita Skeeter. When she spotted Harry lounging with other Slytherin fifth-years by the lake she came straight for him.

“I’m not involved in this in any way,” he told her preemptively before she could get out her Quick-Quotes.

“How does this protest make you feel?” she asked, undeterred. “You’re friends with Miss Granger, correct? Would you care to provide any comments on her actions and stance against the Ministry?”

“I mean, the OWLs just finished.” He shrugged. “It’s not disrupting anything.”

“Do you agree that Albus Dumbledore is the best choice for Headmaster of Hogwarts?”

“Stop asking me questions,” he said.

“_I’ll_ talk,” Pansy said, insinuating herself between them. She put her arm around his waist deliberately as she did so, squeezing before letting go. Skeeter’s eyebrows shot upward. “Ask me anything you want.”

Gratefully, he left them to it; Pansy would know what to do, or at least greatly enjoy getting outrageous claims into the paper.

Draco watched him carefully as he sat back down on the grass. Harry wondered if he was going to comment about — well, about Pansy — but he only said, after a pause, “Peaceful end to the year for once, don’t you think, Potter?”

“Maybe I filled the quota for near-death experiences early,” Harry replied dryly.

It was an absolutely crass thing to say, but Draco laughed, which only proved that Draco understood exactly what he’d meant. It was only just beginning, after all.

The protest lasted until just before the Feast. By then Umbridge had tried everything: more educational decrees, ordering the other professors to remove the students, screaming at Filch to do something, calling in Aurors, taking House points, stripping prefect positions, and finally writing letters of expulsion for everyone involved. This last resort backfired dramatically — news of her use of Black Quills during detentions had just been published the day before, and public sympathy for the students was at a crescendo. Parents were not only apparating to Hogsmeade in concern, they had begun marching directly up to the school with their wands out and hexes ready.

Ironically, it was possibly the most relaxing two weeks Harry had ever spent at Hogwarts. Hardly anyone paid him any attention at all, and with the OWLs over there was no pressure to be productive in any of the lessons. In fact, given that close to two thirds of their classmates weren’t even in attendance, many of the lessons were pronounced to be ‘self-study’ sessions instead. Only Snape carried on with his normal amount of vitriol, but as Snape was likely to keel over if the boiling hatred for all living things were to ever leave his veins, this did not bother Harry overly much.

So really the only downside was that roughly one hundred students had effectively superglued themselves to the floor of the Entrance Hall. For the first day or two the rest of the student body milled around the area and gawked, but by the time the third morning dawned the bubbling excitement had fizzled out somewhat to be replaced with concerns about practical issues. The protest obstructed movement significantly enough that Hogwarts was obliged to grow extra doorways leading outside and into the Great Hall from elsewhere, but either it was reluctant to do so or had not been coaxed properly, because the doors were only large enough for single file and sometimes refused to open at all. Because of this, Harry and several other Slytherins began to take their meals directly from the kitchen instead, carrying them to the common room or other spots in the castle.

One night, fetching dinner for everyone with Blaise, he noticed that the house-elves looked more harried than usual. As Dobby handed them the magically stacked plates, he asked, “Are we causing you extra work? Sorry about that.”

“Sir is not apologising!” protested another elf squeakily. “Sirs is not to blame!”

“Dobby is happy to help,” Dobby agreed. He was wearing three layers of mismatched socks, as well as a pair of shrunken Muggle sunglasses attached to a fine copper chain like it was a necklace.

“Only, it’s just,” Harry went on, “you all seem kind of … stressed.”

“Of course they’re stressed,” Blaise said, taking a whiff of the pies appreciatively. “They’re house-elves, and their routine’s all messed up. Don’t harrass them about it, Harry, they’re working hard already.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Harry protested, but they were already being bowed out.

When he thought about it, it made sense; the one hundred protestors still needed to eat, and actually after the first couple of days several of them had begun sleeping on the floor, too. Other students brought them things like magazines to pass the time, and there were owls flying in and out at random hours to deliver letters. Then there was the issue of going to the bathroom, which several of them did in shifts. All of this meant that the area had transformed into a sort of open dormitory remarkably quickly, and therefore necessitated a lot of cleanup. After he walked by and overheard Hermione reminding them that they should do their own spellwork to keep everything tidy instead of burdening the elves, he had a good idea of what was happening.

“What’s happening is that she doesn’t understand elves at all,” Draco said with an eye-roll. “They hate being condescended to, like everyone else. It’s _their_ castle; if they want to look after it properly, why should a Muggleborn tell them they can’t? She’s being hypocritical by making them deliver meals en masse to a place that hasn’t been properly linked and _then_ telling them that she doesn’t want to inconvenience them.”

Harry sighed. “I don’t think the Muggleborn part is relevant to your point.”

“Of course it’s relevant,” Draco responded hotly. “A proper pureblood would never mistreat an elf that way.”

“Really,” Harry said flatly.

Draco frowned. “What, Potter? We wouldn’t. It’d be a waste of an elf.”

Sirius, Harry remembered, never got along with and certainly mistreated Kreacher, but it wasn’t something he wanted to talk about, so he let it drop.

He did debate the merits of telling Hermione that she was causing the elves undue distress, but could not picture a scenario where that would go over well, especially since Fred and George Weasley took on guarded stances everytime he was in the vicinity, and Hermione herself refused to look at him.

At least Ron was still prepared to be friendly when Harry managed to catch him early in the second week when the twins had gone to shower. Hermione, a few paces away, squared her shoulders and turned her face pointedly in the other direction.

“Wow,” said Ron, taking the offering of chocolate and sweets from Honeydukes. “Thanks, mate.”

“No worries,” Harry responded. “How are you holding up?”

Ron shrugged, stuffing a Chocolate Frog into his mouth. “Not too badly.” He lowered his voice. “Bit boring, really. I’ve been dreaming of running. Feel like my legs are going to vanish.”

“Yes,” said a Ravenclaw girl with a cloud of blonde hair. “We’ve attracted a huge swarm of Dangling Demmoquags, so there is that danger.”

“Er,” Harry said. “Sorry, dangling what?”

“This is Luna,” said Ron. “She was in DA. Her dad runs the _Quibbler_, you know.”

“I know who you are, of course,” Luna said pleasantly. “Hello, Harry Potter.”

“Hi,” he replied. “Nice to meet you.”

“Oh it’s very nice to meet you, too.” She seemed to be in the process of making a necklace comprised of playing cards, feathers and bottle caps. “I always thought it would be.”

“Er. Did you?”

“But you don’t really meet people, so I didn’t think it would ever happen.”

Harry looked to Ron for assistance. Ron, mouth full with more chocolate, returned a look that plainly said it was beyond him.

“You’re friends with Draco, though, aren’t you?” Luna continued. “May I have a sweet, too?”

“Go ahead,” Harry told her. “You know Draco?”

“He asked me to move out of the way once when I was in first year,” she said vaguely, taking a sugar mouse and holding it in her palm. It gave a small squeak and went to sleep. “He wasn’t very nice about it.”

Ron snorted unhelpfully.

“Well,” Harry allowed, feeling extremely out of his depth, “he’s not very nice in general. I suppose.”

“But you’re very good friends with him,” Luna pointed out.

Out of the corner of his eye, Harry caught Hermione crossing her arms. He said, a little vindictively, “Maybe I’m not very nice either.”

“You brought Ron sweets,” said Luna, as if that were irrefutable proof of Harry’s inner angel.

“Ron’s my friend as well.”

“Oh, I see.” Daintily, Luna popped the mouse into her mouth. Harry waited, but she only chewed and said nothing more.

“Anyway,” Ron said, clearing his throat. “Listen, Harry, have you heard from Dumbledore at all?”

“No.” Harry frowned in puzzlement. “Should I have?”

“Just thought maybe he would have contacted you.” Ron leaned in closer. “Since he’s been taking the opportunity to conduct Order business.”

“He wouldn’t contact me unless he needed something from me,” Harry told him. “That’s how he works.”

Ron put up a pacifying hand. “All right. I thought it couldn’t hurt to ask.” There was a hardness in his eyes, a touch of steel forged over the anvil of loss that had not been there one year ago. “I want to win this war.”

“Yeah,” Harry agreed, then said it again: “Yeah. We’re going to.”

When the protest ended, it did so with more confusion than fanfare. One morning they woke up and the Entrance Hall was simply empty, the protesters arranged instead at their House tables in the Great Hall gaping uniformly at the High Table, where Dumbledore sat twinkling as if he had never left. News spread that Umbridge had removed herself in the middle of the night when the Ministry had finally bent to public pressure and an official complaint from the Board of Governors.

Dumbledore gave no special speech regarding his return; he didn’t need to — his presence alone was announcement enough. Instead, there was the _Prophet_ article to ponder over. _HOGWARTS ONE HUNDRED TRIUMPH OVER CORRUPTION_, the headline read. It featured a large generic photograph of Dumbledore, and a smaller one of an embarrassed Fudge giving a press conference. There were quotes from several members of his cabinet expressing discontent with his recent decisions. A separate article entirely was dedicated to an interview with Griselda Marchbanks, reappointed in her position as Elder on the Wizengamot, speaking out strongly against Fudge’s stance on multiple policies.

“His base is crumbling fast,” Draco commented as Harry read over his shoulder.

“Is that good or bad?”

“Too early to tell. My fath — I mean, Fudge always had a towering ego steeped in an inferiority complex; he was easy to manoeuvre. But this might mean more people will believe you about the Dark Lord.”

On the day of the Leaving Feast Harry was called to Dumbledore’s office. He’d been expecting it, and went alone.

“Sherbet lemon?”

He took one. “Thanks.”

“How are you, Harry?” Dumbledore asked, as if Harry weren’t aware that they were playing their annual game of interrogation, as if the events of Valentine’s Day hadn’t happened.

“Fine,” he replied.

“I know that Sirius was —“

“I don’t want to talk about Sirius,” Harry interrupted rudely.

“Then we will not,” Dumbledore conceded after a short pause.

The sherbet lemon fizzed on his tongue. Harry sucked on it obstinately and let the silence build.

“I called you here,” said Dumbledore finally, “to tell you that you need to return to Privet Drive for the summer.” And then he went on to explain about the bond of blood built upon Lily Potter’s sacrifice, as if that was the only way to make someone secure in a world where there were five hundred ways to ward a house.

“Right,” Harry said dubiously when he finished.

“You must be kept safe.”

All around them, the beautiful silver instruments whirled and shimmered. Summer was already building, and it was a hot day, but in Dumbledore’s office you could not tell what temperature it was at all. Harry said slowly, “I don’t see how it’s safer than a Fidelius Charm. Sir.”

“A Fidelius Charm can be betrayed.”

“Aren’t _you_ the Secret Keeper for Grimmauld Place?” Harry asked.

“Do you trust me?” Dumbledore had the barest hint of a smile behind his beard.

“I —“ He jerked one shoulder.

“Or is it the place with Mr Malfoy that you would prefer to stay at?”

Harry sat back sharply.

Dumbledore observed the movement without comment. “In any case, you would not have to spend the entire summer with your aunt. As a matter of fact, I may need your help with something in the coming weeks, and afterward I would be happy to transport you to Grimmauld Place.”

“My help with something,” Harry repeated in disbelief.

Dumbledore folded his hands leisurely and nodded.

“Fine,” Harry said warily. “But on one condition.”

***

Draco cast _Incendio_ on the slip of paper with Grimmauld Place’s address as soon as he’d read it.

“Come visit me over the holidays,” Harry said unnecessarily.

“You don’t even know what you agreed to help him with,” Draco responded. “Why are you such an idiot, Potter?”

“It’ll be fine,” Harry insisted, although without as much conviction as he would have liked.

It _probably_ was going to be fine — even if Dumbledore displayed blatant favouritism towards Gryffindors and did things like award Hermione three hundred points for revolutionary courage or whatever to once again hand Gryffindor the House Cup, he wasn’t evil. He was just an imperfect good, and wasn’t that most people? Voldemort was afraid of him; they needed Dumbledore to win the war, just as much as Dumbledore needed Harry to defeat Voldemort, even if there was only a prophecy for one of those conditions.

Hermione seemed far more at ease now that most things had returned to the status quo, but when he tried to talk to her as they lined up to board the Hogwarts Express she rushed on ahead as though she had not seen him. Ron, following behind, grimaced at him sympathetically and said, “She’s feeling guilty. You know how ‘Mione is. Give it time.”

Somehow the lot of them — Greg, Vincent, Blaise, Pansy, Millie, Draco and Harry — all ended up piling into the same compartment. Draco claimed one of the window seats, and then whinged loudlly about Harry squashing him against the glass. Harry, crammed in by Greg, elbowed him in the ribs, but in the next second the compartment expanded with a sort of grudging creak of wood and metal, so they could all sit comfortably.

Even so, about an hour into the ride Draco fell asleep, his head coming to rest on Harry’s shoulder.

“Now who’s the one infringing on personal space?” Harry muttered. He adjusted his posture and caught Pansy’s eye in the process.

She was sitting across from them. There was a brief flicker of — something, perhaps wistfulness — in her expression, but she covered it with a smile, the one that she wore all the time, the one that meant that she knew what you didn’t.

Greg was saying, “I’m worried about Dad.”

“Yeah,” said Vincent. “So’m I.”

“Will you be okay?” Harry asked. “There’s — I might be able to arrange for you to come stay at my place, if you need to.”

“I thought you lived with your Muggles,” Blaise said, raising his brows.

“I do,” Harry told him, not wanting to elaborate. “But there’s somewhere else.”

“Thanks, Harry,” said Greg. “I dunno, yet.”

“Mum said she wants to move to Switzerland,” Vincent confessed. “Said she’d take me. I think they had a row.”

“It’ll probably be safer in Switzerland,” Harry said. “Maybe you should go.”

“Sounds smart to me,” assessed Pansy. Millie, never one for verbosity, grunted her agreement.

“Yeah but,” Vincent argued, “I don’t know people in Switzerland. And I don’t want to leave my dad.”

And that there was the heart of the problem, the trap that was closing around all of Slytherin: they were too entangled, never mind that only a tiny handful of crazy Death Eaters had wanted Voldemort’s return in the first place. Now that he was back, the cage door was slamming closed on all of them. Harry was acutely aware that they still did not know what exactly it was Voldemort had done to Lucius.

With effort, they pulled the conversation away to other, lighter, topics, but the rest of the trip to London was nevertheless enveloped with a sense of unease, like they were standing in quicksand, watching each other sink in deeper.


	15. Chapter 15

The worst thing about staying with the Dursleys was not the fact of the Dursleys themselves, but being able to listen to the Muggle news, and wonder which of the deaths and disappearances reported were by magic. Had there always been so many Muggle tragedies? It seemed ludicrous that Muggles died everyday, but they did: in car crashes, through illness and overdose, shot by guns or by simply tripping and falling. They were unbelievably fragile.

“What did you say? Shut up, freak,” groused Uncle Vernon, when Harry accidentally murmured the last thought out loud at breakfast.

Harry looked at him and thought about how easily he could die; it wouldn’t even require anything difficult. He could levitate a brick over Vernon’s head — a first year spell — and it would have a good chance of being fatal.

Vernon ripped his gaze away, shuddering, and Harry snapped out of it.

There _were_ odd cases, it wasn’t just him imagining things. Not an hour after she was reported missing, a small girl was found dead without a mark on her in the middle of a road in Cardiff, even though her family lived in Edinburgh; the mother swore that the child had been with them in the park one moment and suddenly gone the next. A group of ten year olds beat an adult man to death with rocks; when the police arrived on the scene all of them were just standing there in a daze, slack-jawed, but when questioned later every single one did not seem to understand what had actually happened, or indeed recall their own actions. An orphanage reported runaways on a massive scale, but none of the missing children had taken any of their personal effects with them, and despite extensive efforts to find them seemed to have vanished without a trace.

It was endless days of that, building tension and reminders that the Dursleys were weaker than he was, that despite the years he had spent in a cupboard _he_ was the one with the upper hand now, and that from Dudley’s perspective it made perfect sense to leave the room whenever Harry entered it.

It made even more sense when Dumbledore arrived to fetch him for whatever help Harry had promised him; as Harry watched Dumbledore’s cheerful intimidation in the living room, it occurred to him that for all that Dumbledore was politically pro-Muggle, he wasn’t — he didn’t have the perspective that Muggleborns did. He saw them exactly the way purebloods were wont to, over the inevitable gap that separated those with magic and those without: as something with less power.

Muggles had flown to the moon, Harry had told Draco, and it was true — even if Muggles died in countless stupid ways every single day and the longest lived of them barely made it past one hundred, there were so many of them it didn’t matter. What mattered was that they were collectively reaching for the stars, that despite profound weakness there was incredible strength, even if the strength was almost impossible to see when the gap created by magic was there.

But then, that wasn’t right either. He couldn’t think of all Muggles as a _whole_, because then they just became a faceless concept, and wasn’t that how it all started?

“You appear rather preoccupied,” Dumbledore remarked, after he’d Side-Alonged Harry to an unfamiliar street.

“It’s nothing,” Harry said shortly.

Convincing Slughorn to teach again at Hogwarts was easy, once Harry had understood that Dumbledore was using him as bait. Slughorn himself didn’t even seem that convinced of his own plan to leave; if Harry had even hinted at the possibility that Voldemort’s return was actually a hoax, Slughorn would have shaken his hand and believed him instantly.

When they left, Dumbledore asked, “Do you recall the prophecy?”

Harry shoved his hands into his pockets. “Of course I do.”

“I’m afraid that we will have much to discuss this year,” Dumbledore said, and the words came with a sigh like he was fatigued. “It cannot be delayed any longer.”

“Okay,” Harry said slowly. “Meaning…?”

“You will take private lessons with me,” Dumbledore explained, and offered his good arm once more to apparate them to Grimmauld Place. Harry opened the door and went inside immediately. The house was empty; there were no lights in any of the windows. Dumbledore stood paused on the threshold. “Will you be all right, Harry?”

“Why wouldn’t I be, sir?” Harry challenged.

“There will be Order members coming in and out during the day,” Dumbledore informed him. “They will bring you anything you need; it is crucial that you do not leave on your own.”

“I know.” Harry looked at Walburga’s covered portrait. “I invited Draco.”

“It has been arranged,” Dumbledore said, like it was _his_ plan, and Harry whipped his head around to stare. “He’ll arrive for the week of your birthday. Remus will see to it, and supervise your trip to Diagon Alley.”

“Right,” Harry said. “Thanks.”

Something strange, like grief, or worse, passed over Dumbledore’s face. It was difficult to read in the light that came in off the street. “I am aware that my advice on this matter is not welcome to you, Harry, but I must continue to give it nonetheless: you cannot always know a person until it is too late.”

“Why,” Harry questioned, every syllable slow to surface, “do you say that?”

Again the spasm of — sorrow, misery, desolation — drove its way across Dumbledore’s features to settle in his blue eyes, which in the dimness just looked black. “Because, Harry, I was once like you.”

It was some sort of confession, but as with all things to do with Dumbledore it was not the whole story, it wasn’t even a comprehensible part of a portion of a story. Harry said, “Were you? How so? Do you think you know me very well, sir?”

“I knew Lily and James,” Dumbledore whispered, so quietly that Harry almost did not feel it for the punch in the gut that it was.

“Don’t talk to me about my parents,” Harry hissed. “And — and I don’t care if you think we’re alike. This isn’t — I’m _not_ you, and I — I won’t be, either.”

They stood there in silence for what felt like ages before Dumbledore replied, inexplicably, “I hope not, for your sake,” and the moment passed. He said, “Good night, Harry. Be well, stay safe. I will see you when term starts.”

***

It was odd to live in a house that now belonged to him but which almost-strangers used frequently as a meeting place. He got used to making small talk with the Order members, some more successfully than others. When no one else was there he talked to the portraits — which very rarely included Walburga, as she clearly preferred Ursa-at-Sea. There were all sorts of personalities; his favourite was a portrait of Cygnus Black the First, an irreconcilably bad-tempered wizard who for some reason enjoyed speaking in rhyme and spent the first hour of their acquaintance griping about a Potter from the 18th century who had definitely not beaten him in a duel.

He spread the rest of Sirius’ ashes in the courtyard, which was no longer golden with ginkgo but green with summer, dominated by youthful maples — Sirius must have succeeded in his synchronisation project. There were beds of flowers and big fat honeybees buzzing around them in the sunlight, which persisted even when it was raining across the rest of London. It was — it was too much to bear, but he forced himself to spend time there anyway, practising spells, watering the plants with _Augamenti_.

Draco arrived on the 30th. By then, Harry had almost lost track of the dates, so when he heard footsteps in the hallway he assumed at first that it was another Order meeting, or just someone coming in for tea (they did that, as if Harry couldn’t tell they were under orders from Dumbledore to keep an eye on him), until there were some muffled thumps and Draco’s voice shouting, “Potter!”

Harry ran out of his room and down the stairs and there Draco was, sea salt in his hair, a sneer on his lips.

“God,” Harry said, and held his arms perfectly still at his sides.

Behind Draco, Lupin knocked his knuckles on the wall to get their attention. “I’ll be back on Saturday to take you two to Diagon Alley.”

“Okay,” Harry replied absently. “Thank you, Professor Lupin.”

Lupin coughed a laugh. “I’m not a professor anymore, Harry.” But he left without further ado.

“You’re a complete mess,” Draco reproved instantly, wrinkling his nose at Harry’s thin crinkled t-shirt and dusty jeans. “Have you even attempted to brush your hair over the past month?” He stepped closer and ran his fingers through the hair in question: once, twice, the second time lingering.

Harry dipped his neck and let him do it, closing his eyes almost involuntarily. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said softly.

There was a pause. Draco let his hand drop. “Well,” he said, casting a critical eye over their surroundings. “I — Great Aunt Walburga’s house has seen better days, I’d like you to know, but I suppose I’m glad to be here, too.” He moved away and dipped around the corner in the direction of the kitchen. “Merlin, what have they done to the place? Where’s the house-elf? Don’t tell me — there _is_ an elf around somewhere, isn’t there?”

“Yeah, Kreacher.” Harry followed and leaned on the doorway. Draco was lifting the lid of a pot someone from the Order had left on the stove, making a disgusted face at its contents. “Don’t know where he’s gotten to.”

“Why not?” Draco demanded. “He’s your elf now, isn’t he? Go on, then. Summon him.”

“Er.” Harry raised his voice slightly. “Kreacher? Kreacher!”

A sharp _crack_ sounded in the air, and suddenly there Kreacher was, dirty rags and all. He was muttering to the ground even as he materialised: “… mustn’t upset the Master, oh no, but what would my poor Mistress say … blood traitors and vermin leaving muck everywhere, and one by one, going, going …”

“Hey,” Harry said. “Kreacher.”

Kreacher sighed; it sort of sounded like a windmill collapsing. “What does Master command?”

“That’s one depressed elf, Potter,” Draco observed. “And you had the gall to insinuate that _I_ would mistreat an elf.”

Harry sputtered. “What — I only got here two weeks ago! What was I supposed to have done?”

Draco came to stand next to him, in front of Kreacher. He snapped, “Kreacher, was it? Look up when you’re being spoken to.”

Indignant, Harry opened his mouth to tell Draco to be kinder, but miraculously Kreacher _did_ look up, standing straighter.

“I’m Draco Malfoy,” Draco announced haughtily. “The son of Narcissa Malfoy, née Black. Do you recognise me? You should. I have a blood claim to this house, and I’m appalled to find it in such a condition.” He swiped a finger along the surface of the table. “A temporary infestation of outsiders is no excuse.”

For some bizarre reason, Kreacher looked buoyed by the scolding. But still he countered, “They didn’t care, they wouldn’t stop … they threw out Master Regulus’ treasures, they threw it all out, we were powerless …”

“How many generations of Blacks have you watched grow up and live in this house?” Draco interrogated. “Count them in your heart. You cannot give up on this place; it still has endless centuries left.” Turning, he glared at Harry pointedly.

“Er,” Harry said hurriedly. “Right. Draco’s right, Kreacher. I — I might not know how to best look after Grimmauld Place, so I’ll need your help. I _do_ care. I want to try. The Order still needs to use this place as headquarters for a while yet, but I won’t let them mess it up any longer. You have my word.”

A flicker of hope, brittle and weak, began to bloom in Kreacher’s expression. “Master cares?”

“I care,” Harry affirmed. He looked to Draco; Draco nodded. “I would like the house put to order; you can start with the kitchen and the sitting room.”

“And the first dining room,” added Draco. “We’re not eating in the kitchen.”

“Yes,” Kreacher said, and he actually sounded _happy_. “Kreacher will bring out the second best china, and dust the mantlepiece, and fill the vases with flowers of the season —“ he disappeared with a pop.

“There.” Draco tugged on Harry’s elbow and moved them both back to the central staircase, which he began to ascend. “If you’ve been here two weeks, you could’ve managed that earlier.”

The tone was unexpectedly gentle, so Harry just said, “I figured maybe if I bumped into him I could — I don’t know, have a talk. It seemed rude to just demand that he appear.” He hesitated. “Sirius didn’t … wasn’t good to him.”

Draco turned as he climbed, gaze understanding. “I see.”

“I sometimes thought he should’ve just let Kreacher go,” Harry admitted.

“Shh!” Draco said sharply as they emerged onto the first floor.

“I mean,” Harry continued, quieter, “I thought he could have found another family that would have appreciated him more.”

“He’ll be appreciated _here_, where he belongs,” said Draco. “House-elves are manifested by a property when it gathers enough magic over the years to gain sentience, Potter. I told you before: they’re family.”

“Family I give orders to?” Harry led Draco down the corridor to his bedroom. To his surprise, there was an extra bed next to his own, as if Grimmauld Place had guessed that they would prefer it that way.

“That’s the agreement.” Draco knelt down to poke curiously at the snake in the carpet and then walked over to the windows to stare into the courtyard. “Between the wizards who built their homes stone by stone, spell by spell, and the magic that learnt to speak and cause mischief. The magic didn’t want to leave, and couldn’t leave, and the wizards didn’t want to expel it, not really, so they came to an agreement for coexistence. The elves are bound to obey, and the wizards are bound in turn to protect the house and nurture it. It’s symbiotic. If a property is abandoned for too long it loses its sense of self and the elves born from it perish.” He left the windows to open the wardrobe: his robes were already inside. Harry blinked in surprise, then noticed that Draco’s trunk, which they had left in the hallway downstairs, was sitting at the foot of his bed.

“What about Dobby?”

Draco snorted lightly. “A crazy outlier. You know that. He wanted to be free, and the greater whole of the Manor was willing to let him be free. As ‘free’ as he can be, at least. But if you try to apply the same policy to every other elf, you may as well cut out their hearts while you’re doing it.” He sat down on the bed, bouncing as though testing the mattress. “Anyway, you shouldn’t really have to order around your elves; that’s the mark of a stilted relationship. The elf is the house, the house is the elf. You need to learn the idiosyncrasies of the house, and it will learn yours in turn.”

“Er. Okay.”

Rolling his eyes, Draco just said, “You’ll get there even if you’re an idiot, Potter.”

“Shut up, Malfoy,” Harry retorted, then smiled to take the sting away.

Draco smiled back.

***

Grimmauld Place changed dramatically over the next few days: every window let in more light; saturation came brilliantly back to the hues of the upholstery and the rugs; even the air itself felt clearer — Kreacher had indeed brought flowers and greenery to the various empty vases and pots that had previously been lying abandoned in dark corners and the edges of walkways to trip over inattentive Order members. The kitchen was transformed completely; the chipped teacups vanished, the dull tiles on the wall cleaned to reveal wondrous shades of sea green and sapphire blue, and the floor became a rich grey stone to balance the palette. The old stained table had been replaced with a clean central countertop. It looked peculiarly modern, and Harry said so.

“The house is trying to guess what you like,” was all Draco said.

He was right: the ground floor kitchen was meant for Harry; Kreacher had his own elsewhere. The second time Harry brewed a pot of tea he found that the cups he had chosen previously had moved to the front of the cupboard. (The third time, the pot was already brewed and waiting for him when he went in. The fourth time, the entire tea set popped into being before he could even get up from his chair.) The utensils along the walls and the contents of the fridge all gradually arranged themselves in this manner around his habits. Frankly, it was a little overwhelming, but it also felt — like love. Not really knowing what it signified, he had said to Kreacher: I care. But the words meant something to the elf, and meant something to the house. It was showing him that it cared back.

They spent his birthday flying around the courtyard; the turns were especially tight, and the lack of visiblity through the trees made the Snitch extremely difficult to spot — they actually collided into each other at one point when they both went for it from different directions, crashing onto the ground completely winded and bruised. Draco got it that time; once he regained his breath he laughed and laughed, maple leaves all over his clothes and his left leg still hooked into Harry’s, a bee buzzing in consternation next to his temple, the captured Snitch buzzing back.

That afternoon, Harry discovered the Black library. The upper corridors in particular had been rearranging themselves, and the portrait of Cygnus had vanished from its place on the fifth floor landing, so he had gone looking.

He was sure that no one had seen the library before; at the very least, if Hermione had known about it she would have said something. It was a vast room with a tall ceiling, the bookshelves arranged in smooth arcs that wrapped around a circular reading area in front of the windows, which were enchanted — Harry stepped up to the glass and put his hand to it; it was ice cold.

Outside was the galaxy.

He couldn’t tell if it was real, or just a fabricated image. It looked real, better than the photographs he had seen in Muggle science books, better than what he had seen through telescopes during Astronomy classes.

“Where did you …” came Draco’s voice. Then: “Oh.”

“How…?” Harry asked.

“It’s a spell,” Draco said, as if that answered the question. He gestured upward. There was an orrery, burnished gold and silver, floating high above the padded chairs. “I imagine it’s linked to that. Mother might know more. Or we could ask one of the portraits, I suppose.”

He’d been able to handle the kitchen and the courtyard, but this — he wasn’t even a _Black_, he —

Harry said, “Maybe it’d be better if you were the —“

“Don’t,” Draco cut him off.

“But you said once before, the entailment —“

“If you really mean it, we can discuss it,” Draco said. “But not on a whim. Especially not right now.”

“All right,” Harry acceded. Something caught his eye; there was a familiar book sitting on one of the square tables. “Hey,” he said, “it’s that book you like.”

“What?”

“Here,” Harry said, walking over and picking it up. He hadn’t seen it in a while, but he recognised the print on the spine. The author’s name was T. Lestrange.

“Oh.” Draco took it from him and flipped it open. “Maybe this was Mother’s original copy.”

Harry thought back. “You said it was written in the 16th century? What’s it about?”

“15th,” Draco corrected. “It’s an obscure classic.”

“Is there an English copy somewhere?”

“An English copy,” Draco echoed with a bemused expression. “Is that a thing Muggles do? Make extra copies in different languages? You could just ask it to be in English, Potter, the publisher embedded translations for at least thirty languages.” He flipped open the book to look at an index of available languages, then got out his wand and tapped the cover. “19th century British English, please.”

And so it was: the title changed before Harry’s eyes to read, _Archer and the Tree of Before_.

“See,” Draco said, and then very confusingly went to the nearest bookshelf and put the book away.

“Oi,” Harry complained. “I wanted to read it.”

“It’ll bore you.” Draco stretched, nonchalant and fooling no one. “Come on; it’s dinner time.” He turned and walked out.

Glancing back at the book, Harry went with him. What Draco was forgetting was that Harry still had three weeks alone in Grimmauld Place before school began again; there’d be plenty of time to satisfy his curiosity later.

***

The Order members were largely pleased by the changes to the house. Hestia Jones even asked to be given a full tour (Harry politely declined, since he genuinely wasn’t sure how long it would take). At first he watched their movements through the ground floor rooms with a pinch of trepidation, aware now that it was his duty to — to care, but apart from the gaping and the occasional surreptitious groping of the velvet curtains in the drawing room, no one displayed even the slightest hint of being disrespectful. If anything, they were far more considerate than they had been the weeks before; for instance, he noticed Elphias Doge spelling his boots clean on the welcome mat (which did not say ‘welcome’ at all and was in fact a bit temperamental).

“I’m glad to see the old residence finally in order, Mr Potter,” he said approvingly when Harry caught his eye. He looked behind Harry. “Mr Malfoy.”

On Saturday morning there was a knock on the front door, and Harry, thinking it was Lupin, opened it to find Cedric Diggory.

“Oh!” Diggory exclaimed, straight white teeth all ablaze, “Harry. Hi. Did anyone tell you? I’ve joined the Order. I heard — I mean, you live here now?” He was as irritatingly handsome as ever.

“Yeah,” Harry replied. “I do live here.” He stepped back. “Come in.”

“Potter,” Draco called down the stairs, “can you tell him to wait a moment? I just need to —“ The rest of it was inaudible.

“It’s not Lupin!” Harry yelled back. He turned to Diggory. “I think the Order meeting is for later today, you’re a bit early.”

“I’m here to accompany you to Diagon Alley, actually,” Diggory said. He rubbed the back of his head and grinned. “First assignment, you know. And I only got the headquarter’s address from Dumbledore a few days ago, so I thought I’d take the opportunity — you don’t mind, do you?”

“Er, no. Not at all.” Harry led him into the sitting room. “Tea?”

“Milk, please. No sugar.” Diggory looked out the window. “Nice place. Mum was always partial to the idea of having a house in the city. We’ve got a country estate ourselves.” Tea and biscuits appeared on the table. “Cheers.” He took a sip. “By the way, was that your friend Malfoy just now?”

“Yeah,” Harry said. “He’s coming with us to Diagon Alley.”

“He’s part of the Order, too?”

“We’re underage. We can’t join.”

“No but, I mean.” Diggory gestured awkwardly. “You know. He’s on our side?”

Harry stared at him coldly. “You think Dumbledore would let him in here otherwise?”

Diggory put up his hands. “Just wondering, that’s all.”

“Of course you were.”

Wincing slightly, Diggory said, “Forget I asked. Sorry.”

With effort, Harry offered him a close-lipped smile. “It’s fine.”

“Don’t be so prickly about it, Potter,” said Draco from the doorway, adjusting the collar of his robes and not even looking at them. Diggory jumped, spinning around. “It’s perfectly logical to think that I might be a Death Eater spy.”

“Except for the part where you’d be absolutely terrible at it,” Harry muttered.

“Excuse me?” Draco puffed up indignantly. “I’d be totally suited to being a spy. I’d be so good you wouldn’t even _know_. How dare you.”

Diggory started to reacquire his look of awkward suspicion from earlier.

“For god’s sake,” Harry said in exasperation, standing up and moving over to shove at Draco lightly. “Stop making it worse.”

“_You_ stop ruining my fun,” Draco commanded, but then he leaned in and whispered, “I need to talk to you alone.” His eyes were serious.

Harry drew in a sharp breath. He said to Diggory, “Wait here.”

They went all the way out into the courtyard before Draco said, “Mother sent an owl. She says Aunt Bella’s been in the vicinity of Ursa-at-Sea.”

“Shit.” Harry shoved a hand through his hair. “What should we do?”

“I don’t know that we can do anything,” Draco said, a line of worry on his brow. “She’s safe under the Fidelius.”

“Should we —“ Harry bit his lip — “I could ask Dumbledore to give her this address? It’s probably safer here.”

“You could, I guess.” Draco sounded unconvinced. “There’s another thing. Mother thinks that the Dark Lord is moving into the Manor. The wards were ripped, and the whole place is — it’s in a terrible state, and —“ he stopped, squeezing his eyes shut.

“Hey,” Harry said, reaching out, not touching. “We’ll get the Manor back.”

“That’s just it,” Draco said angrily. “Mother — she says she regrets not going and respelling the wards herself; she says that the Manor must have been partly why — why the Dark Lord — why Father was like that, in the end.”

Reluctantly, Harry said, “She’s right. I didn’t tell you — you were still Confunded, at the time. Lucius, he was — he mentioned it. He didn’t want to hand the Manor over. That’s why —“ that was why Lucius had tried to hand Harry over, instead.

Draco looked like he was going to be sick. “Mother needs to stay at Ursa-at-Sea, Harry. She has to be safe.”

“I know.” Summoning courage, Harry put his hand to the side of Draco’s neck, his thumb tracing Draco’s jawline. “Draco, I know. Tell her — we’re going to win the war. She’s a Slytherin. She won’t go charging in.”

“She doesn’t think of it like that,” Draco said. “She’s — she’s smart. That’s the problem. And.” He gulped. “She’s like me. She’ll want to know what happened to Father. She wants revenge.”

Bracing himself, Harry asked, “Did you … did you ever tell her…?” How Lucius had died. Exactly how.

Draco curled inward. “No.”

“Tell her she’s putting _you_ in danger,” Harry said.

“Do you think I don’t know how to manipulate my own mother?” Draco raised his right hand and gripped Harry’s by the wrist, bringing it down gently. “I don’t think it’ll work, not properly. She thinks the opposite, she thinks she’ll be protecting me.”

Harry read the despair on his face. “She might be.” He continued quickly, as Draco opened his mouth, “No, listen. Your mother’s a terrifying witch. A lot of people respect her. But Fudge is being replaced by Scrimgeour, and you know _his_ reputation.” He paused, trying to find a way to word it better, but couldn’t. “Draco. I think she should join the Order. Wait, let me finish. We’re not even of age — how are we supposed to do this? Snape won’t tell us anything.”

“You said Dumbledore’s giving you private lessons this year,” Draco pointed out.

“Yeah,” Harry said. “But what I mean is — we’re already here in Dumbledore’s camp whether we like it or not. So we may as well do it properly. Think about it: it’ll be an advantage when the war is over, as well. If your mother joins the Order, she’ll have more resources to use, and she can — it’ll give Slytherins something to consider. They won’t trust Dumbledore, but they’ll trust Narcissa Malfoy. Won’t they?”

Draco’s grip on his wrist was becoming painful. “It’ll make her a target. And Dumbledore may not even allow it.”

“She’s already a target, if Bellatrix is looking for her,” Harry argued. “Dumbledore will; he’s pragmatic, he’ll want to use her.”

“You mean to make our own faction in Dumbledore’s party,” Draco concluded.

“I mean that there’s nothing else we can feasibly do,” Harry told him urgently. “I can’t think of anything. Can you? Last time — last time we didn’t go to Dumbledore, and —“

Draco jerked away, turning to walk behind and around the tree they had been standing beneath. When he reappeared his face was even paler, but he said through clenched teeth: “Okay. I’ll write to her.”

***

They went back to the sitting room to find Lupin there as well, buttering a scone.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Draco said brightly, having dumped a bucket of false cheer all over his person. “Shall we go?”

Diagon Alley was more subdued than usual; some of the shops had closed, including Ollivander’s. The rumour was that Ollivander had been kidnapped, but while walking past the boarded up shopfront Harry heard one woman tell her companion quite loudly that she had it on good authority Ollivander was on holiday in Australia, which told him all he needed to know about the general level of denial. As long as Voldemort was yet to be seen in public, a significant portion of wizarding Britain was keen to keep their heads in the sand.

Their trip proceeded without incident until the very end, when they entered Madam Malkin’s for new robes and found Ron and Hermione already there.

“Oh hey, Harry,” said Ron immediately, waving and paying Draco as much attention as he would have a complete stranger. He squinted out the window. “Is that Cedric?”

“Yeah, and Lupin,” Harry said. “They’re, er. Guarding us, I suppose.”

“Sucks to be chaperoned, huh? How’s your summer been?”

“Eh, you know.” He shrugged. “All right.”

The silence from Hermione was beginning to vacuum all the air out of the room. Valiantly, Ron asked, “So, how many OWLs did you get? I didn’t do too badly.” He grinned. “Six.”

“Nice!” Harry said, ruefully adding, “We both got nine.”

“No way, mate,” Ron said, looking impressed. “You’ve become a right swot, you have.”

“All he did was study, Weasley,” said Draco, tone remarkably mild, holding out his arms for one of Madam Malkin’s assistants. “You should try it.”

Ron ignored this jab to announce triumphantly, “Hermione got ten.”

Draco sneered. “We only took nine subjects each.”

It seemed for a second that Ron wasn’t going to engage, but then he responded, “She still got one more than you, Malfoy.”

“All finished,” said Malkin to Hermione, glancing at Draco warily.

Hermione stepped off her stool and sniffed pointedly. “Don’t bother, Ron. He’s always going to think he’s better, because he doesn’t know how else to function.”

Harry got up stiffly on the stool next to Draco. Draco looked at him questioningly, and when Harry only grimaced, said, as though nocking an arrow, “What was your boggart, Granger? I heard that they give you trouble. Let me guess: you’re afraid of not being good enough.”

There was a sharp intake of breath from more than one person in the room. Hermione drew herself together and came closer, tilting her head up. Somehow, the aura of intimidation came off her rather than Draco, who — atop the stool — was several heads taller.

She said heatedly, “You’re the one who should be afraid of not being good enough, Malfoy. Don’t be so overconfident as to think it doesn’t matter.”

“How needlessly cryptic,” Draco returned coolly. “Shall I spell it out? You think I’m not good enough, specifically, for Potter. You think everything I represent is not good enough for Potter, or for you.”

“You —“ Hermione began, but visibly swallowed what she was about to say. “Harry said that the Hat offered him Gryffindor, and it was only because of _you_ that he ended up in Slytherin.”

“So it’s about interhouse rivalry.” Draco looked supremely disdainful. “Grow up, Granger.”

“Done,” said the woman who had been measuring Ron. She gathered the tape and went to the back room with haste.

Ron hopped down. “Hermione, let’s —“

“No,” Hermione disputed. “It’s about influencing someone for the better or the worse.”

“Obviously,” said Draco. “Your downfall, Granger, is that your worldview is too narrow.”

Hermione looked like she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “As if _you_ — you’re the one who’s entrenched —“ She stopped, too enraged to continue.

Smirking, Draco suggested, exactly like he didn’t mean it at all, “Then shouldn’t we broaden each other’s horizons?”

“As if I would,” Hermione started to say, and then seemed to realise that this was not exactly the best route to take. “I don’t trust you, Malfoy.”

“You don’t even know me, Granger.”

“I know your _kind_. I know where you came from.”

Draco’s tone turned dangerous. “Do you?”

“Picture this,” Hermione said intently. “Your father alive, or Harry. You’d pick —“

Harry hadn’t told her about just how Lucius Malfoy had died. When it came down to it, only he and Draco knew; the fight had been far too chaotic for anyone else to have seen.

“Hermione,” he interjected. “Stop —“

“My father is dead,” Draco said, voice glacial, except there were cracks in the ice, “and if I had to choose again I would still —“ the words caught in his throat and you could see him fighting, hurting to get them out — “I would still pick —“

“Shut up!” Harry yelled.

“What —“ Ron said, looking dazed.

“Shut up,” Harry said again, furious. “Shut the fuck up!” He got off the stool and pushed Hermione; he’d meant to do it just enough so that she’d back off, so that she’d give Draco some space, but he misjudged the amount of force — for some reason he’d been expecting resistance, but Hermione was caught completely off-guard. She stumbled and then tripped and fell against a rack of robes. Malkin made a gasp of horror.

“Hey!” Ron shouted. “What the fuck? She wasn’t even the one talking.” He got between Harry and Hermione, glaring, ears red.

“Shit,” Harry said, heart dropping. “Are you okay?” He made a motion towards her; Ron slapped his hand away.

After a pause, Hermione levered herself up. She was dressed in a Muggle shirt and denim shorts, and it was incredibly out of place against the pile of traditional wizarding robes. “It’s fine, Ron. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“That’s right: you shouldn’t have,” Harry told her, regaining a bit of his original momentum. “It’s none of your business who he’d pick. Now or ever.”

Hermione closed her eyes and took a deep steadying breath. “I only meant — I didn’t realise. I’m sorry.” She turned and repeated it to Draco: “I’m sorry.”

The commotion had attracted the notice of Lupin and Diggory; they rushed inside. Lupin said, “What’s going on?”

“Merlin’s sceptre, Harry,” Ron exclaimed, barely glancing at their entry. “What’s your problem? Isn’t it a good thing that —“

“Ron,” Hermione interrupted. “It’s … I think we should go.” She turned to Malkin, who was already spelling the rack of robes back up. “I’m so sorry for the scene. Is it all right if we come back later to pick up our order?”

Malkin was frowning, but only said to Hermione, “We’re open until six today. Or we can owl it, if you prefer.”

“I’m very sorry, too,” Harry told Malkin roughly, feeling the wave of adrenaline drain away, leaving shame in its place. “If there’s any — I mean, if there are damages, I’ll pay. Sorry.”

“We’ll come by, thank you,” Hermione said at the same time, and then, dragging a bewildered Ron behind her, left with extreme haste.

“What was that about?” Diggory asked.

“Nothing,” Harry replied shortly, miserably, getting back up on his stool.

“Looked kind of like something,” remarked Diggory. He lowered his voice. “I’m amazed they’re not kicking you out.”

Lupin said, concerned, “Are you all right, Harry?”

Draco was staring off to the side, face closed and bloodless. The assistant assigned to him nervously rolled up the measuring tape and said, with surprising sympathy, “That’s you finished, dear.”

Draco started. It took him a moment to step down. When he did, he glanced up at Harry, saying woodenly, but undeniably making an effort to be lighthearted, “The Hat actually really did offer you Gryffindor, Potter? That explains a great deal.”

“Yeah,” Harry told Lupin. “I’m fine. I’m really sorry. It won’t happen again.”

***

That night, into the warm summer darkness, Draco said, “I used to think that I’d grow up to be just like Father. I’d daydream about getting an Order of Merlin and making him happy. Grandfather Abraxas died so young, but I knew Father was going to live forever: he would watch my children grow up, and their children grow up, and their children grow up. The Manor would be home to five generations of Malfoys at once, like it used to be during the golden age. I’d walk through the long empty corridors and assign every bedroom to an imaginary family member.” He paused; Harry could hear him gulping in air. “I didn’t — I didn’t _want_ to know. I didn’t. He let me read accounts of the war and all the articles said that he’d been under Imperius. And then —“ Draco laughed, the sound was heavy and sunk like a stone — “he told me about you; you were the same age as me but you were already in _books_, and they all said you were a hero, and he said, ‘Draco, it would elevate our family name if you were to be seen in the friendly company of Harry Potter when the two of you attend Hogwarts together. He’ll grow into power, but he won’t know how to best wield it. Do you understand?’

“Of course I understood. I was going to do it flawlessly, and then I did, and then — you were completely — you weren’t like how the books portrayed you, at all. You were just some kid. Do you know what I did? I wrote to Father and I said that Harry Potter was practically a _Mudblood_, you spoke like them and you acted like them and what in Salazar’s name was I supposed to even do with you? And Father wrote back and said to have patience; he said that Dumbledore had robbed you of your birthright, and that this was our chance to influence your development for the better.” Draco laughed again, mirthless. “So you see, Granger was right.”

Harry sat up and swung his legs off his bed. Draco’s was barely a metre away. “Shove over.”

“It’s too hot,” Draco complained, but even as he said so the temperature in the room noticeably dropped; the house was listening. He sighed and did move over then. Harry climbed on and they both got under the covers.

“I know that you were trying to — influence me, or whatever,” Harry told him. “I’m not totally stupid. It was pretty blatant.”

“Father was pleased,” Draco murmured, still facing the ceiling. “It was perfect. The Malfoy name was going to have more standing than ever, once you graduated Hogwarts and became the Minister for Magic, or maybe just a celebrity, and through my hold on you Father would be able to finally make a real push for the sort of legislation he wanted introduced, and we’d build a second golden age together, and I didn’t know _anything_, I was the stupid one, not you; it was never going to happen, because, because —“ he choked, voice suddenly hoarse. “Harry,” he said, and there definitely were tears now, and Harry had made the decision to invade Draco’s bed but he had no idea what to do. “I _wish_ I could have chosen my father. I _wish_ it could have been that easy. Why did it have to be you? Why did it —“ and Draco was sobbing, ugly and heaving and noisy and wet, and Harry made panicked shushing noises and reached over and pulled him into his embrace, awkward and uncomfortable, but Draco let him do it, the whole while flinging more words into Harry’s chest, barbs through the skin: “I _loved_ him, I failed him, I couldn’t, I couldn’t, I couldn’t.”

“I know,” Harry said, again and again, nonsensical, but he did know. He did. He had to, or else why had Draco chosen him?


	16. Chapter 16

Harry sat in the courtyard and read _Archer and the Tree of Before_.

He wasn’t one for novels, never having had access to them in the first place as a child. Stories were for other people, he’d learnt, kids whose parents read to them at bedtime. The one time he’d tried to borrow a picture book from the school library to read by torchlight, he’d been caught and locked in the cupboard for over a week.

Having nothing to compare it to, he couldn’t tell if the story was especially long or short. The book was both thinner and smaller than a textbook, but the print was tiny. He thought that it was a pretty long story, since it took him three days to read, but the prose was at times incredibly dense, so maybe he was just slow and it was fairly short after all. He also got the feeling that the text in the book changed; it lengthened a scene when he found it interesting and summarised when his attention wandered. At one point he finished a chapter and went back to an earlier one to check on details and found himself reading what he could have sworn were completely new paragraphs he’d never seen before. It was very perplexing.

Archer was a druid — the term that the book used — living in a small magical village in an unspecified land. The story began with a long lull of halcyon days, bountiful harvests and joyous festivals to celebrate the first moons of autumn. Archer’s contemporaries, as well as Archer himself, did not own wands; they were capable of performing great spells with just their intent wrapped in a word, and, belonging to a peaceful culture, they intended only to help the land flourish and to celebrate beauty.

In time, however, things began to go wrong. A child was born without magic — so unheard of that the characters did not have a name for the malady. Their annual ritual to call down the rains was unsuccessful. A wrathful drought took over. As it drained the soil of moisture, so too were the villagers drained of their power. One by one, spells stopped working, and, one by one, Archer’s friends died from heartache and lack of nourishment.

As their numbers halved and quartered, a travelling bard passed through the ailing village and sang of the legend of Syscallon, the elder tree. Syscallon was old when the world was young, said the bard. Its seed was a fragment of the core of ancient magic itself, and it remembered all. It was the Tree of Before. Wood harvested from it could be shaped into an instrument that would be capable of changing the pattern of life itself, and so Archer, despairing and hopeful and half-mad with sorrow, set out to find it.

He journeyed for seven years across unfamiliar country, at times encountering cities of plenty, other times discovering those so decrepit they were worse off than his people had been. On rare days he thought of as lucky, his magic returned to him, although diminished and unreliable.

During his travels he met a woman called Gaea whom he fell in love with, and they surmounted the ordeal of the last year together, climbing higher and higher to the centre of the world, further and further away from the ocean, ascending far above the natural treeline, for Syscallon grew in the crater of an ancient volcano, the tallest mountain known to anyone. The final stretch was the worst; they were cold and wet at night when the clouds rushed in, and burnt relentlessly by the sun during the day. The road was one long continuous neverending slope of gravel and ash — no snow, despite the altitude; it was said that Syscallon did not allow it. They depleted their store of hard bread despite most careful rationing, and Archer could not summon his magic at all. And yet still they kept climbing.

Finally, they reached the summit, and there in the dip of twilight was Syscallon, its roots stretching the entire diametre of the crater, its leaves a deep soul blue in the waning light.

Half delirious, the two of them moved wearily to the trunk so that Archer could select a branch to take and make into a staff. He had to step on Gaea’s shoulders to do it, and when his hands made contact with his selection the spirit of the tree spoke to him.

It said, _You may take freely the material you seek, but the task you will render with it must exact a price._

Archer asked what that price might be.

Syscallon replied succinctly: _Yourself, or your companion, or the rest of the world._

And Archer knew that he could not forsake the world to save a single village, and he loved Gaea too much to trade her for anything, so he carved the staff and fed its hunger with his own life, and through his sacrifice magic was restored to his people, and all was well.

Harry didn’t get it.

He could see why Archer had made that particular choice; that wasn’t the issue. The issue was that he couldn’t understand why Draco had read this story so intently, and why he had been so reticent about it. It was just a classical myth about a hero, and there wasn’t even an epilogue explaining what had happened to Gaea afterward; overall Harry found it a bit wanting. Was there some hint in it about performing wandless magic? Or maybe it was well written, in terms of prose? He had no idea.

It did occur to him in a flash of amusement that if Archer had attended Hogwarts he definitely would have been sorted into Gryffindor, but that was neither here nor there.

***

He saw Hermione again on Platform 9¾ as she was boarding the Hogwarts Express, and once again tried to talk to her to apologise and make up, but she pretended not to see him, even as her cheeks flushed with colour.

“Come on,” Draco said, bumping against his shoulder. “Parkinson says Zabini got a compartment down this way. Take my trunk, will you? I’ve got Prefect duty till lunchtime.”

Vincent hadn’t gone to Switzerland after all, but he looked like he had lost weight over the summer. Greg seemed to have fared a bit better, but then again, it was Greg. Harry privately thought that Greg could worry his way through an apocalypse and still eat three full meals and get eight hours of sleep per night, as long as someone else served the meals and provided the sleeping bag.

They passed the morning talking about trivial things, like Harry’s being made Captain of the Slytherin Quidditch team, and Millie’s new ventures into yoga.

“You have to focus the spell at the same time,” Millie was saying as the door slid open and Draco and Pansy joined them. “It’s really extremely demanding both physically and magically.”

“What is?” Pansy asked, and the two of them spent the next half hour arguing about various floatation techniques that went completely over Harry’s head.

They had lunch from the trolley and Draco was just getting comfortable for a nap on Harry’s shoulder when a second-year Slytherin, chin up with false bravado, opened the door and delivered invitations from Slughorn to Harry, Draco and Blaise.

“So it’s true they got Slughorn back this year,” Blaise observed, then smirked at Pansy. “Guess he knows what’s up.”

“Please,” Pansy said, making a face. “He clearly doesn’t, if he didn’t invite me.”

“If there’s caviar I’ll bring you some.” Blaise winked at her.

Harry had thought that Draco would enjoy the opportunities presented in the Slug Club meeting, but he was uncharacteristically quiet, speaking only when spoken to. Interestingly, Ginny Weasley was there, and when she addressed Harry with familiarity Slughorn made an ‘o-ho’ sound and started interrogating them on how they knew each other.

“I’m friends with her brother, Ron,” Harry explained.

“Of course, of couse,” Slughon said enthusiastically. “And do you have a lot of friends in different Houses, Harry?”

“Er. Just a few in Gryffindor. I guess?”

Slughorn didn’t miss a beat. “Then just think of all the friendships you have the chance to discover, now! Why if these rumours about you are true …”

Harry didn’t imagine that Slughorn actually wanted to talk about the rumours concerning him, since they pertained to the fight at the Manor in February, and Slughorn was still half pretending that Voldemort wasn’t alive. _Harry_ definitely didn’t want to talk about it, since from what he understood they painted an extremely distorted picture of events based partly on the _Prophet_ interview and partly on collective fantasy.

“… they’re calling you the ‘Chosen One’!” Slughorn finished.

“What?” Harry frowned. “No, they’re not.”

“Fresh in today’s issue,” Slughorn said, beaming; he waved his wand and a silver platter with the _Prophet_ floated over.

“Let me see that,” Draco said, grabbing it. He read swiftly, his face growing subtly darker as he did so.

Slughorn didn’t seem to notice and carried on the conversation with tales of his previous students; the network he detailed was undeniably impressive. Even if Harry didn’t recognise most of the names, he recognised the positions. Blaise looked like Christmas had come early.

Harry could see that Draco was waiting for an adequate opportunity. When a pause in the dialogue presented itself, he said smoothly, “My sincere apologies, Professor Slughorn, but may Harry and I be excused?”

“But it’s barely been an hour!” protested Slughorn. It had in fact been two.

“We would be honoured if you would invite us again at a later time,” Draco reassured him, “but I have just remembered a matter of urgency. I’m sure you would understand.”

“Oh, well,” Slughorn said, sounding disappointed. “I do remember being young and boisterous. Off you go then.”

They didn’t need to be told twice. Draco led them all the way outside to an intersection between carriages, the noise of the tracks and the rushing wind ensuring their privacy, before he scoffed, “Young and boisterous.”

“What, Malfoy?” Harry said, raising his eyebrows. “Are you old and tired?”

Draco hit him lightly on the arm, then grew serious. “The article implies that someone within the Ministry leaked the existence of the prophecy to the paper.”

“So an Unspeakable, then.”

“It doesn’t matter who it was or what station they hold,” Draco said impatiently. “What matters is that the leak happened. Someone’s been twisting arms. This was top secret. The Ministry is breaking. The Dark Lord must know definitively that the prophecy’s been destroyed.”

“He’s still not making an open move.”

“He doesn’t need to, Harry. At this rate the quagmire of uncertainty is going to do half the work for him.” For a second Draco _did_ look old and tired. “I want to know what Dumbledore is thinking, letting it get to this state.”

Harry asked, “Did Narcissa…?”

“They’re in correspondence,” Draco replied unhappily, then at the expression on Harry’s face confirmed, “Yes, I think so.”

“That’s something, at least.”

“I’ll tell you what’s a better something,” returned Draco. “Those private lessons of yours. If those don’t reveal any of that old fool’s secrets, every single one of us is doomed.”

***

To Harry’s great disappointment, Snape did not give a marked reaction upon finding out that he had achieved Outstanding in his Potions OWL. He merely sneered and drawled, “Well, Potter, it would seem that basilisks can be hatched by accident after all. Charms, Defence, Herbology, Potions, Transfiguration and Ancient Runes. How predictable.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Harry muttered, annoyed, but Snape had already moved on to Draco.

“Mr Malfoy, you’ll be pleased to know that that we have the minimum of four required to conduct Alchemy lessons this year. You’ve cleared the prerequisite Outstandings in Arithmancy, Herbology, Potions and Transfiguration, so you qualify.”

“Will you be teaching it, sir?” Draco asked eagerly.

“The advisory roles will be divided between myself and Professor Slughorn,” Snape replied. “You’ll find that the course relies on your own initiative more than pure instruction, particularly as we progress. As for the rest: same cores as Potter, I see. But I wouldn’t advise that you take both Advanced Arithmancy and Ancient Runes. You’ll have very little free time.”

“I like them both,” declared Draco stubbornly. “If there aren’t any conflicts, I don’t want to drop either, sir. I already had to drop Astronomy.”

“On your head be it,” Snape said, and handed him the timetable.

“Morgana,” Pansy commented, “you should’ve been in Ravenclaw, you colossal swot.”

“You know you like it,” Draco said, batting his eyes at her exaggeratedly. She snorted and turned away.

“I can’t believe Snape voluntarily gave you good advice and you chose to ignore it,” Harry said. “You’ve got Prefect duties as well, Malfoy.”

“_You’ve_ got Quidditch tryouts,” Draco pointed out.

“Oh, that’s right. We’ve got vacancies.” Harry leaned in closer. “You going to have a go?”

Draco blinked at him, then scowled. “I’ll take Seeker or nothing, Potter. Don’t be an arse more than you can help.”

Sighing, Harry said, “Fine. You won’t have time, anyway.”

In a display of hitherto undemonstrated potions prowess, Ron of all people brewed a near perfect Draught of Living Death in their first Potions lesson with Slughorn and won the bottle of Felix Felicis.

Slughorn appeared just as surprised as anyone. “Well!” he said, recovering quickly. “Talent must run in the family! Your sister Ginevra startled me with her Bat-Bogey hex, and you have certainly astonished in your turn with your masterful brewing skills. Wonderful!”

As they filed out of the classroom, Harry could see Hermione whispering irritably in Ron’s ear about something. She had gotten out her wand and was casting a spell over the copy of _Advanced Potions Making_ Ron had been given from the storage cupboard.

Pausing to look with him, Draco remarked disparagingly, “The least subtle cheating I’ve ever had to witness.”

“Eh,” Harry replied mildly. “I doubt he did it on purpose.”

“What a waste. We could have put that liquid luck to purposeful use,” was all Draco said.

The rest of the week proceeded at a brisk pace. Despite his occasional free periods, Harry felt as though there was barely any time to even talk. In fact, with the push for non-verbal incantations, the one time Harry _had_ decided to take a break and looked up from his Ancient Runes homework to say something, he’d interrupted Theo’s silent attempt to turn a shoe into a hedgehog.

If Harry thought he had it bad, Draco had it worse. True to Snape’s warning, Draco’s schedule was packed; Alchemy classes — or consultations, as they were apparently called — were held late at night or in the early morning, so Draco was liable to disappear directly after dinner and get up far earlier than the rest of them. By Friday night he was already so pale with strain he looked like a Petrified ghost.

“Five points from Gryffindor for running in the corridors,” he barked at a first-year as they exited the Great Hall after a quick dinner. “And ten points from Hufflepuff for terrible colour coordination.”

Harry looked around. There wasn’t even a Hufflepuff nearby. “You can’t deduct House points just because you don’t like their general colour scheme, Draco.”

“I can too,” Draco contended. “Two points to Slytherin if you take me to the Room of Requirement and let me nap for an hour.”

“Only two?” questioned Harry in mock indignation, but he obliged the request. This time, the Room he summoned had hints of Grimmauld Place, and Draco fell onto the bed with a grateful groan.

Harry sat down at the table by the window, cast a ticking _Tempus_ and worked on Transfiguration theory, trying to not let the ginkgo outside distract him. When the hour was up he went over and shook Draco awake; he’d been tempted to let him rest for longer, but knew it was a bad idea; by now Harry had actually seen the hypothesis and research plan Draco had drawn up for Alchemy. ‘Ambitious’ was one way to put it. ‘Masochistic’ was possibly another.

They kept working until it was well past midnight. Despite the hour, the common room was still relatively full with fifth-years and above when they got back.

“I’ve got Prefect duty tomorrow morning,” Draco told him quietly as they entered the sixth-year boys’ dormitory. Blaise and Greg were already sleeping, curtains closed. Harry lit a small candle between his and Draco’s bed so as to not disturb them. “And I’ll be in the alchemy lab all afternoon. Tell me about Dumbledore’s lesson on Sunday if you don’t catch me before.”

Harry took off his outer robes and chucked them across the chair near his bed. “Prefect duty on a Saturday?”

“Tour of the castle for the first-years.” Draco yawned widely. His hair, usually so immaculate, was still fluffed up from when he had napped earlier.

“Ah,” Harry said slowly. “I remember now.”

What he remembered was that it was more of an initiation ritual than anything else. The sixth-year Prefects who had been in charge during theirs had sent them on a race through every single floor where they had been required to complete tasks and collect items to bring back within an allotted timeframe. If you failed a task or were the last one to arrive then you were docked points in the race. Successfully completed tasks awarded one point each. Anyone with points was allowed to trade them for favours with their fellow competitors, as long as the trade was overseen by a Prefect. The two people with the least points at the end of the race were punished with carrying the sixth-years’ book bags between classes for a week. That had been Theo and Millie, at the time. Theo, Harry recalled, had finished on _negative_ points. Knowing Theo, he’d probably been distracted by a portrait speaking Old English or something.

“Should be fun,” Draco said, so tired he was slurring his words. In the soft candlelight he looked warm and touchable. Harry flexed his hands and toed off his shoes. “And I’m guaranteed to get a minion. Hurray.”

Harry looked at him and looked at him, at the mess of his hair and his infuriatingly thick blond eyelashes and the curve of his shoulder, scapula visible briefly as he shrugged into his sleepwear. It was just skin; it was just hair. But god, _god_.

“Done?” Draco asked, and for an alarming second Harry thought Draco wanted to know if he was done staring — but no, Draco meant the candle.

“Yeah,” he said. “Done.” And instead of using his wand or his breath he reached out with his fingers and snuffed the flame out.

He wasn’t practised at it: for half a burning heartbeat there was heat, sweetly painful, right at his fingertips.

***

“So,” Harry said, crunching on another sherbet lemon, “what has this got to do with the prophecy? Sir?”

They had exited the Pensieve and Dumbledore had just finished elaborating on Merope Gaunt and Voldemort’s origin.

“Several things,” Dumbledore replied, tone patient. “We’ll get to them in time.”

“I thought you said there could be no more delay.”

“I am not delaying, Harry. I am simply presenting to you what I know in chronological order. We cannot rush ahead, especially when my own knowledge is not yet complete.”

“Right.”

Dumbledore adjusted one of his instruments. A minute passed. He said, “I understand that Narcissa Malfoy’s request to join the Order was your doing.”

“So what if it was?”

Still with an air of benevolence, Dumbledore asked, “Is this level of hostility really necessary, Harry?”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “You would have let Draco _die_, back in February.”

“I was working to rescue him.”

“No,” Harry denied. “You were making plans for your own ends, and if they included his wellbeing it would have only been by coincidence.”

Dumbledore regarded him without speaking for a long moment. “Do you agree that this war must be won?”

“Yes.”

“That Voldemort must be defeated?”

“Yes.”

“At any cost?”

Harry hesitated and glared. “I know what you’re doing.”

“Correct,” Dumbledore said equably. “You know what I’m doing. I’m working to win this war, to defeat Voldemort.”

Hackles rising, Harry said, “I don’t _care_. Draco isn’t — you don’t get to put his life on a scale like that.”

Again, Dumbledore did not reply immediately, instead letting Harry seethe in silence. The worst thing about it was that there was _understanding_ in Dumbledore’s eyes, like he knew precisely Harry’s issue, like he knew and despite that, would not change, because he also knew better.

Dumbledore flicked up his sleeve, revealing the whole of the blackened and damaged arm he had been sporting for weeks. He said, “Do you perhaps recall, Harry, that I was wearing a peculiar looking ring when we visited Professor Slughorn in the summer?”

Harry thought back. “It was the same ring from the memory.”

“Indeed.” Dumbledore smiled. “I was injured in the course of acquiring that ring, and the state of my arm is the result. The curse can be delayed, but not removed. I have perhaps a year left.”

The ground seemed to lurch. “You mean — to live?”

“Yes,” said Dumbledore.

“But,” Harry said blankly. “I …”

“I do not tell you this to manipulate your sympathy,” Dumbledore went on calmly, drawing the sleeve back down, “but to make this point: Draco Malfoy is not necessary to win this war. _I_ am not necessary to win this war, in the end. _You_, however, are. It is a great burden, but you must bear it, and be aware of it.”

“But,” Harry said again. It didn’t — it was ridiculous. Dumbledore was the only wizard Voldemort was afraid of — he couldn’t just —

“So you see,” Dumbledore continued, “there is much we must cover while we still can. We cannot rush, but we must not delay, or be sidetracked. I understand that you have your grievances with me, Harry, but I would appreciate if you put them aside for now.”

Harry stood up, his mind a wreck. “I have to — I should …”

“It’s late,” Dumbledore said. “You should rest.”

“Right.” He strode over to the door. He felt like he was going to be sick.

“Harry?”

He turned back, breathing shakily. “Yes, sir?”

“I realise you will likely share what you have learnt today with Mr Malfoy regardless of my opinion on the matter, but I must still impress upon you the weight of this information, especially in regards to the state of my health. It must _not_ spread. Do you understand?”

He nodded, mechanical.

“Thank you, Harry. Good night.”

***

Harry kept the knowledge of Dumbledore’s curse to himself. He wanted desperately to tell Draco, but — he didn’t know how. It sounded like a lie, more surreal than real. And anyway, there was the Slytherin situation to consider; Narcissa had joined the Order — if Draco knew that Dumbledore had only a year to live it would influence his correspondence with his mother, even if he promised to not tell her directly, and Narcissa was too smart to not pick up that something was wrong. As soon as she did — who knew how the coin would land? If Dumbledore was not alive to bargain with then who could offer the Slytherins protection, a way out? Snape? Harry himself? He felt simultaneously fifty years older and far too young to deal with any of it.

But he’d have to. If Dumbledore died it really, truly, did all fall on him.

“Hey,” Draco said, knocking into him as they headed down to the Quidditch pitch. “You there?”

Snapping out of it, Harry said, “Yeah.”

“You’ll want to turn your brain on for this, Potter,” Draco warned. “There’s going to be a crowd.”

It was Sunday morning the week after. He’d come down early with Draco to get in an hour of flying alone before the tryouts.

“What do you mean, a crowd?” he asked warily.

“You really have been out of it, haven’t you,” remarked Draco; Harry could hear the masked concern. “Was seeing the face of the Dark Lord’s mother so traumatising? Or is it the lack of sleep?”

“Sleep.”

“Hm.” Draco peered at him analytically. “All right.” He mounted his broom and kicked off the ground, hovering above. Harry joined him. “But what was it that Death Eater used to say? Constant vigilance?” They began to fly a meandering lap around the field. “You’ve picked up some stalkers, Potter. I can’t believe you haven’t noticed.”

“What?” Harry said, flipping around and under him to rise again on Draco’s left side. “Stalkers?”

“Admirers,” Draco clarified snidely. “Interested parties. Potential sycophants.”

“I have no idea what you’re on about, Malfoy.” Harry flattened himself against his Firebolt and picked up speed, losing himself in the force of the wind. If only everything could be so fluid, so easy.

Draco caught up with him as he slowed down again. “I mean _girls_, Potter, you oblivious idiot. You’ve gotten a foot taller over the summer, and what with the brooding green eyes and the ‘Chosen One’ mystery, they’re all drooling like a pack of trolls.” He swerved and shot back down to the box that held the Snitch before Harry could respond. “Ready?” he called, and didn’t bother to wait for Harry’s confirmation. The Snitch shot outward in a blur.

And then it was pure competition, just the two of them, weaving around each other like they had been born flying in tandem, occupying the same space, chasing after the same thing.

The Snitch drew them up high and then plummeted down low, barely a metre above the grass. Harry finally caught it near the eastern goalposts, tumbling into the grass directly after, breathless with adrenaline and laughter, Draco rolling down on top of him.

He brought his right hand up to the rising sun and smiled fondly at the struggling Snitch. He started to say, “I don’t believe you about this supposed pack of girls, Malfoy —“ but Draco was all of a sudden blocking the light, leaning forward, his arms braced on either side of Harry’s face, and Harry didn’t understand that the kiss had happened until Draco was already drawing away.

“Shit,” Draco said.

Harry sat up at once. “Excuse me? What?”

“No, I mean —“ Draco was holding one hand against his mouth, pressed there like it was barring entry, and looked just as shocked as Harry felt, which Harry thought was a bit unfair. “I mean. I mean shit.”

Harry tried to process this and ended up with a rising tide of indignation. “You kissed me.”

“Yes, thank you, I’m aware,” Draco replied rudely. “I didn’t mean to.”

“You didn’t mean to,” Harry repeated.

“I mean I — I didn’t, but I did want to,” Draco said nonsensically. “I shouldn’t have.”

“Why not?” Harry questioned.

“Because!” Draco exclaimed, and then failed to give any sort of reason whatsoever. “Merlin and Morgana. Fuck. I need to —“

But he was interrupted by the arrival of several Slytherin Quidditch team hopefuls on the other side of the pitch, lead by Greg and Vincent. Glancing at Draco, Harry stood up, offering him a hand. To his relief, Draco took it, though his expression was guarded.

“Hey, Harry,” said Greg as he drew near. “Malfoy.”

“Morning,” greeted Vincent.

“Morning,” Harry replied, and miraculously he sounded quite normal.

“Are you trying out as well, Malfoy?” asked a Slytherin fifth-year named Urquhart.

“No,” Draco said frostily. He summoned his broom to his palm and kicked off towards the stands.

That turned out to be the best thing he could have done, because he’d been right: there was quite a crowd, and Harry desperately needed to focus. To begin with, a whole bunch of people from _other_ Houses had turned up, as if they had thought he wouldn’t notice. Most of them were — to his consternation — giggling girls, but there were some boys as well, likely hoping to sneak through and steal intel on the Slytherin lineup for the year. He yelled them all off the pitch; one Gryffindor tried to slip a piece of parchment into his robes as she went, to the entertainment of the remaining Slytherin audience. He waited until she was out of eyesight and cast _Incendio_ on the note without reading it.

After that it was more manageable. None of the first-years made the cut, but then again none of them would have expected to, even if the majority of them had been flying seriously. There was one girl in their number, another Rosier, who he thought might qualify in the years to come.

“You’d be a good Chaser,” he told her.

She gave him a look that was remarkably like the one her sister Yvonne had frequently employed when dealing with the lower years. “I prefer Seeker.”

Of course she did. He was glad Yvonne had graduated already. “Wait your turn, then.”

Surprisingly, Daphne ended up filling one of the Chaser positions. Her flight pattern with Urquhart and Vaisey had some rough edges, but it was already remarkably cohesive considering the fact that they were all new; with training, he could get it to work.

“I had no idea you were such a good flyer,” he said as she touched down.

“Oh, I’ve always enjoyed it,” Daphne said. “But, you know.” She smiled cheekily. “The team was always such a sausage fest.”

“Er,” Harry said awkwardly. As far as he could tell that aspect hadn’t really improved.

“Don’t worry, Harry,” Daphne said laughingly. “Ria talked me into this, but I do want to do it.” She gestured at the stands. Astoria was sitting with Draco.

The Keeper position was more difficult. What was best for it was some good solid bulk, but the candidates all ranged from small to medium builds, except for one abrasive seventh-year who spent too much time running off the mouth at Greg for hitting a Bludger in his direction, even though that was Greg’s job.

He resolved to settle for the best option available, which turned out to be a third-year boy named Selwyn-Hester. Selwyn-Hester looked like he would fall over if you sneezed on him, but in actuality possessed a sort of aggressive enthusiasm for performing knockbacks of the Quaffle with the butt of his broom that was quite beautiful to watch once you got over the nagging idea that he looked somewhat like a rabbit rebounding bowling balls.

“Wow, Potter,” Selwyn-Hester said jubilantly when Harry told him he’d made it. “This is going to be _great_. When’s our first practice?”

The pitch was emptying. It was nearly time for lunch. Harry stomach growled noisily. “Let’s try Tuesday evening, five-thirty sharp. Sound good?”

There were no complaints, so he was at last free to make his way to the stands. Astoria was still there when he arrived.

“Hello, Harry,” she said. “I’m glad Queenie made it on the team.”

“Yeah,” he said, trying for a smile. “She’s fantastic. Do you fly, too?”

“Oh, no,” she replied, standing up and dusting off her robes. Draco stood up as well, clearing his throat. “I don’t have the constitution for it.”

“Ah. I see.” Harry looked at Draco. Draco was looking at the sky.

“Would you mind,” Astoria asked politely, “walking with me to the castle? We haven’t had the chance to speak properly in a long while.”

She knew very well that they had never spoken alone together, if that was what she meant by ‘properly’. “All right,” Harry agreed.

“I’ll be in the Room, Potter,” Draco said, and made a beeline for the stairs like the stands had caught dragonfire.

Astoria waited until he was out of sight, then began to descend as well. Harry followed uncertainly, wondering if perhaps he should — offer her his arm like a gentleman, or something. She sometimes gave off that air.

“Shall we take a detour around the lake?” Astoria suggested, once they were clear of the pitch.

“Sure,” said Harry.

“Queenie always wanted me to fly with her.” Her pace was slow; he had to concentrate to match it. “But Father didn’t approve of me on a broom. Queenie was always stronger; he is quite proud of her flying. I think some sense of guilt must have held her back from trying out for the team earlier.”

“Okay,” Harry said. “Er. Look. I don’t mean to be blunt. Or at least, I don’t mean to offend you. But I got the impression you wanted to talk to me about Draco.”

Astoria just laughed lightly. “I was working towards Draco. The best conversations need foundation, you see.”

“Can’t we just … cut to the chase?”

“We can,” Astoria said, amused.

“So,” Harry prompted nervously.

“So,” Astoria echoed.

“You had something to tell me?”

Astoria slanted an unreadable look over at him. “I don’t have anything to tell you that you don’t already know. I fancy Draco. I think our families would be a good match. I have every intention of pursuing him, if he would allow me.”

“Oh,” Harry said, voice small.

“Actually,” Astoria went on, “I was hoping you could tell _me_ something. It’s a delicate question, which is why I was working towards it, but as you prefer to cut to the chase, so to speak, I’ll ask it without softening: do you think you have enough to offer Draco that would justify the disappearance of the Malfoy legacy?”

Harry stopped walking.

“He’s the last of the Blacks,” Astoria said gently. “The last of the Malfoys.”

_Of course_ that was what Draco — he was an idiot for not understanding immediately. “For fuck’s sake.”

Astoria stopped, too. “Pardon me?”

“Sorry,” he told her. “Can you — d’you mind if I just — I have to go. Um. Enjoy the rest of the walk. It’s good weather.”

He got on his Firebolt and shot off towards the castle before she could get out another word.

***

Part of Harry had been expecting otherwise, but Draco actually _was_ in the Room, except it was the Room as neither of them had ever seen it before.

“What’s all this?” Harry asked as soon as he opened the door.

Sitting on a small stool that seemed to be made out of glass or crystal at the bottom of one of the massive piles of what could only be described as random junk, Draco shrugged. His line of sight was focused slightly to the left of Harry’s face. He said, “I don’t know. It goes on forever. I guess I was —“ he gave a barely perceptible wince — “asking for a place to hide something.”

“Something?” Harry prodded, moving over to open the door of a wardrobe. A heap of old-fashioned robes and a plastic box of Muggle cotton buds were inside.

Draco stood up and went around the pile, out of sight. His voice floated back: “You came here quick. Potter, you barbarian, did you tell Astoria you’d walk her and then dump her on the grounds?”

“Yeah, about that,” Harry responded, going around the other side so that they were face to face again in front of a broken statue of a unicorn. He took a deep breath. “She’s still interested in you. Are you interested in her?”

Draco froze, like he was holding himself still so that he wouldn’t run away, and then he replied, “It isn’t fair to her.”

Harry leaned against the statue and crossed his arms. “But?”

“But I wanted to —“ Draco stopped. He turned away and kicked a stack of dusty books with unnecessary force. “I was going to sort myself out.”

The books fell in a messy heap. Draco’s fists were clenched; the line of his back was stiff as though he, too, were carved out of stone. Harry asked, “And is it working? Are you?”

Draco whipped around, eyes flashing, but didn’t come any closer. “What do you think, Potter?”

“I think,” Harry said, crossing the distance and securing a hand around his wrist, “that you could’ve spelled it out for me a lot earlier.”

“And what would that have accomplished?” Draco demanded crossly, backing up against a painting of a waterfall in spring — mist and rainbows, wild daisies in the foreground. Harry pressed him into it, bringing his forehead close until they were touching.

“We could’ve,” Harry began, and finished by kissing him.

Instantly, no hesitation at all, Draco kissed back, breath hot, a quiet gasp escaping, his right hand coming up to tangle in Harry’s hair. His other hand wriggled out of Harry’s grip and reached to tap at Harry’s glasses, which were in the way — Harry knew that, but he didn’t want to — he pulled back for half a second to take them off, and Draco was softer, more of an impression and less of a reality.

The pause was long enough for Draco to whisper, “You pillock.”

If there was supposed to be accusation in the tone, Harry couldn’t hear it; he kissed Draco again, unobstructed, and Draco was still letting him, opening up so that Harry could lick inside, just the tip of his tongue, and then he changed his route and kissed the corner of Draco’s mouth, his cheek, the edge of his jaw until it met his ear, because Draco was clearly still trying to talk, and he was saying, “Harry — you — hey, are you listening? I can’t. We shouldn’t.”

“We can,” Harry insisted into his skin. “We seem to be.” But he stopped and rested his head on the canvas of the painting all the same; in the shadow of their bodies the waterfall gushed without end, its roar completely soundless.

“I can’t,” Draco said again. He pushed Harry away; not too far, just far enough to speak face to face. “It’s not fair.”

“Since when did you care about being _fair_?” Harry returned. “We should, we can mess around. Can’t we?”

“Mess around,” Draco said slowly, not quite his preferred drawl, and even with blurry vision Harry could see him straining to control the words, “like you do with Pansy? That’s what you — you think that would go well, do you? We could start and just stop, at any time?”

Harry hadn’t, with Pansy, since the last school year. “I want —“

Aggressively, Draco interrupted, “I know what you want. But I — I don’t have the luxury. I can’t —“ He shut his eyes.

It was stupid. They were young, too young to be thinking about — about children, and legacies, but that was exactly what Draco was doing. Harry said, “Isn’t there, I don’t know, some sort of potion or something that could. Um. Er. You know.”

Draco’s eyes snapped open. “Are you — Potter. Are you using your brain at all? Did you just — you can’t indirectly offer to — you can’t, anyway. There isn’t a potion.” Then he laughed, like he couldn’t believe this conversation was happening.

“Okay,” Harry said, equal parts relieved, disappointed and confused. “Well, I —“

“Stop,” Draco cut in. “Just stop. I don’t even want kids.” He saw the look on Harry’s face, the one that said he wasn’t making any sense, and added, “Shut up.”

Harry backed away another half a pace to give him space, because he was obviously crazy. “You don’t want kids, but you’re — planning to have some. Right. Okay.”

“Shut up,” Draco said again, stepping forward into the space immediately so that Harry had to step back and surrender even more. “Why would I want kids? Even when I — when I … even when I wanted to fill all the rooms in the Manor I never thought that I _wanted_ kids. As if anyone at our age would.”

“Some people do,” Harry said. “Some people know.”

“Do they? Good for them. Harry, don’t pretend that — you know exactly what I mean. There are only twenty-eight pureblood lines left in Britain, and two of those have bled down to me. Everyone else is dead, or a Death Eater, or married a Muggleborn. No matter what I do, I, I have to — centuries of magic unbroken, Harry. It has to go on.”

“It is going on.” Harry let go of him. “It _will_ go on.”

“I know you think about it differently,” said Draco viciously. “I know you don’t care. But I do.”

Harry wanted to tell him that whatever he was thinking about fairness, to Astoria or to Harry, it was already unfair, because life only ever happened over uneven surfaces. It was already unfair because Harry had held Draco in his arms in the night and knew Draco’s secret, knew that Draco’s childhood dreams for the future had already collapsed.

Harry reminded him: “This isn’t going to end. Between us.”

“Of course it isn’t,” Draco returned, with real anger now, like Harry was threatening to take it away. “It’s not. Even, even if.”

“Just confirming.”

“It’s not,” repeated Draco, scowling. “I only need to — to sort myself out, and you need to — I don’t know. Mess around with Pansy.” The scowl deepened.

“I don’t want to mess around with Pansy,” Harry growled.

“Fine!” Draco pivoted and stalked away, further into the room, knocking over an empty bird cage. “But — it’s not ending. And —“ Harry caught up in time to hear the dry click of his throat as he swallowed — “we shouldn’t.”

He looked defensive and unhappy, like he was aware that he had made a selfish, preposterous proposal that would not work, except he had convinced himself fully of its import, and even like this he was familiar and irritating and dear, all the more so because Harry could still clearly feel rather than see the shape of his mouth.

Harry took out his glasses from his pockets and put them on. He wanted to fight, but there wasn’t anything to prove. Draco knew. He knew, and was still asking for this.

“Fine,” Harry said through his teeth. “Your way. We won’t.”


	17. Chapter 17

To the annoyance of the whole class, Ron’s performance in Potions became dramatically inconsistent. When he did well the results were, according to Slughorn, on par with some of the best students Slughorn had ever taught, but when he did badly his cauldron was liable to produce explosions large enough to compromise anything within at least a three metre radius. Draco and Harry began to strategically take the farthest seats possible, but still suffered multiple casualties.

By the fourth time, even Harry had had enough.

“Do you mind, Weasley?” Draco hissed loudly over the coughing. “Must we be subject the consequences of your immense incompetence every second lesson?”

“Oh go marinate your ugly face in dragon dung, Malfoy,” Ron responded at an equal decibel.

“Did you add the bubotuber pus without stabilising it in the fittlewood powder first?” Harry asked accusingly, taking advantage of the confusion to slide into the chair next to Ron and peer into the smouldering mess of his potion. “Really, Ron?”

“You sound just like Hermione,” Ron grumbled.

“You’re cheating,” Harry said irritably. “If you’re cheating, why can’t you —“

“It’s not cheating!” insisted Ron vehemently. He shoved over his copy of _Advanced Potions_ and pointed at the open page. “It’s just notes.”

Squinting, Harry read, “‘Pus to powder ratio three to five, let soak above in thin even layer before mixing.’ Well why didn’t you do that?”

“Oh,” said Ron. “Is _that_ what it says? I thought it wanted me to mix it with the rest at the same time …”

On his other side, Hermione made a huffing noise of disapproval.

“For crying out loud — why don’t you two make up already so you can yell at me together?” Ron exclaimed, throwing his hands up.

Hermione objected at once, “I don’t _yell_, Ron.”

Stubbornly ignoring the change of topic, Harry asked, “Who did this book belong to, anyway?” But Slughorn, having dispelled the fumes, was clapping his hands and calling for order, so Harry was obliged to get up and go back to his own table instead of wrestling out an answer.

“Did you tell Weasley to drop out and leave the rest of us in peace?” Draco wanted to know as soon as he returned.

“He’s having trouble reading the notes he’s using to cheat,” Harry explained in a low whisper.

“As if I needed proof that he’s illiterate,” Draco muttered darkly.

Harry rolled his eyes. “The handwriting _was_ pretty bad. You know, all cramped and stuff. Uneven ink. Kind of reminded me of Snape’s.” He froze. “Wait.”

“What?” Draco asked, before he caught on. “Oh, no. Really? You think it’s Professor Snape’s old textbook?”

“Might be.”

Interest and mischief slid into being side by side on Draco’s face. “Can we … check?”

“He seems pretty attached to it; I dunno if he’d lend it to me.”

“What exactly is the point of you, Potter, if you can’t even get a Weasley to lend you a book?” Draco lifted a brow and smirked. “It doesn’t have to be for very long.”

Post-agreement, Harry had expected Draco to — to create distance, or put up walls, or something, because that was what a normal person would have done, but Harry had miscalculated: Draco was weird and crazy, and what actually happened was that he started flirting. Harry didn’t know what else to call it. His smirks were more acute, his gazes more intense, his hands more possessive. It was as though he’d gained confidence, and Harry longed to demand of him what his deal was, because it was agony, but there was no way to bring it up without — possibly physically pushing Draco into a shadowed alcove, which Harry had promised he wouldn’t do, so his only option was to endure.

He nudged Draco with his elbow to stop the smirk, which had too much warmth in it, and said, “I’ll ask him at dinner.”

***

“No way,” said Ron. “You’ll give it to Malfoy, and Malfoy won’t give it back.”

“I promise we will,” Harry said, insinuating himself onto the seat and pretending to be oblivious to the looks of red-and-gold disapproval directed his way. “I’ll bring it straight to you tomorrow morning. First period Charms, right?”

“But I was going to do my Potions homework tonight,” protested Ron. Hermione coughed so dramatically she appeared to actually choke on the roast beef.

“I’ll swap you my book for the night,” Harry offered.

“You can have _my_ Potions book anytime you want,” said a girl coquettishly from further down the Gryffindor table. Harry recognised her from the Slytherin tryouts. She whispered something into the ear of her friend and both of them collapsed into giggles.

“Er, okay.” Harry looked back at Ron. “Tell you what, give us the book for a night and I’ll trade you Malfoy’s notes for the essay due Thursday.”

Ron wrinkled his nose. “Malfoy’s notes?”

“He’s top in Potions, Ron,” Harry told him impatiently. “And he’s taking Alchemy, and his notes are extremely well ordered and precise.”

Hermione looked like she was dying to make a comment, but before she could decide whether to break the silence between them or not, Ron said, “Yeah yeah, I don’t need the whole Malfoy is wonderful and farts rainbows routine you do —“

“What,” said Harry, miffed, “I never —“

“It’s just the way you say it.” Ron shrugged. “All right, mate, but the book comes back first thing, undamaged. With Malfoy’s amazing notes or whatever.”

“Done,” Harry agreed. “Cheers, Ron.” They shook on it.

“Make him wash his hands before he touches it!” called Ron as he walked away, book tucked under his arm.

“Mission accomplished,” he said to Draco as soon as he sat down. “You need to cough up your essay notes, though.”

“You bartered away my notes?” Draco asked, passing over a slice of treacle tart he’d saved from the clutches of Greg and Vincent. “You need to get better at bargaining, Potter.”

“Cheers,” Harry said, taking the slice. “And no, I’m brilliant, actually, because we have Snape’s old book with _all_ his notes for the price of one essay.”

“We don’t _know_ that it’s Professor Snape’s book yet,” Draco argued, but surrendered the point. They finished eating quickly and went back to the dungeons; the dormitory was empty. Harry sat down on his bed and kicked off his shoes.

“Ron replaced the cover,” he observed as he got out the book. “Huh. ‘Property of the Halfblood Prince.’”

“Let me see.” Draco sat down as well and dragged the book over until it was between them. “That proves it then. Fath — I mean, I’d heard. He’s a Prince through his mother’s line.”

“You mean it’s a surname?”

“Of course it’s a surname.” Draco _tsk_ed and flipped to another page. “It used to be a prominent family, but it broke apart. I hear they’re still extant in the male line in Germany, but they’ve long since interbred with Muggleborns.”

“Oh no,” Harry remarked sarcastically. “How horrible.”

“Hm,” came the noncommital reply. “Look at this: he’s suggesting you can use the mucus from Spontaneously Vanishing Slugs to enhance the efficacy of armadillo bile, but I thought — oh, I see.” More flipping. “I wonder if he’s ever tried to submit these edits in a proposal to the publisher?”

“Clearly not, if there’s barely any difference between the version of the book he used two decades ago and the one we’re using now.”

“He’s got spells in here, too,” Draco went on, pointing at the page and not listening.

“_Levicorpus_,” Harry read. “What’s it do?”

A frown was forming across Draco’s mouth. “I’d guess it performs levitation on a body, based on the Latin.”

“Want to try it?”

Draco gave him a look. “You want me to try a spell when its full function is not transparent.”

“Why not?”

Draco obviously could think of several reasons; Harry watched his face journey through a number of expressions before settling on resignation. He said, “I think I know this spell, anyway. Fa — d’you remember the World Cup?”

“Sure,” Harry said without giving it much thought, and then _did_ remember: the Muggles, floating in the air upside-down. “Oh. Yeah. That spell.”

“It’s likely.” Draco closed the book. He stood up and went to his desk, coming back with a sheaf of parchment that must have been his essay notes. Then he drew out the acacia wand from his sleeve and tapped it against the book and the notes. “_Geminio_.” When he was done there were three volumes lying on the bed sheets. “Here,” he said, and passed back the original, a copy of his notes stuck inside.

“Thanks.”

“Replicas will erode,” said Draco, attitude all at once brisk. “So I want to make real copies. It’ll be useful for our NEWTs.” He tossed one of the duplicates on Harry’s desk with a _thunk_. “You can help. We’ll split the list.”

Harry groaned.

***

“So it’s owl-order,” Pansy said, settling back in her chair with her Butterbeer.

“It’s a scam, Pans,” said Daphne disdainfully. “Some Hufflepuff tried the potion and grew scales all over her face.”

Pansy sniffed. “Jillandus tried to combine it with a home remedy. She’s a Hufflepuff, what do you expect?”

“What’s this about?” asked Draco as he came back from the toilet.

It was their first Hogsmeade weekend of the school year, and though Draco had made some atrocious argument about his Alchemy proof and unobtainable ghost peppers, or something, Harry had put his foot down and insisted on at least an hour away from textbooks at the Three Broomsticks. He felt like it’d been an eternity since any of them had sat at a table together not for the express purpose of study. Slughorn’s dinners, where there was more bootlicking than real conversation, did not count.

“I already told you about it last week,” Pansy said to Draco.

“Did you?”

“You’re losing your touch, Malfoy.”

“What I’m doing is getting all the NEWTs, Parkinson. Watch me.”

Pansy rolled her eyes. “Someone is selling nonstandard potions via owl-order. The prices are ridiculous, but the word is they work.”

“What kind of potions?”

Blaise winked and smiled suggestively. “Love potions, mostly.”

“There’s all sorts of things on offer, actually,” Daphne clarified. “I overheard Brown saying they even do custom for an extra fee. But the Gryffindors are hoarding all the forms. And that just about proves it’s a scam.”

“Terry Boot got slipped one and got down on one knee for Corner,” Pansy said, smirking. “Not that maybe there wasn’t something there already, possibly, but he’s been so mortified about it ever since …”

“I thought it was sweet,” said Daphne, but she sounded amused all the same.

“Corner’s after Ginny Weasley,” Blaise informed them. He was on his second chocolate liqueur.

“Him and half the available male population of the entire school,” Pansy said, sounding disgusted. “What’s she got, apart from being ginger?” Her eyes lit up with mischief. “Of course, Weasley has a crush on _you_, Harry.”

“What?” Harry said, dumbfounded. “Since when?”

“Since always.” Pansy sniggered. “Yeah, I’d wish her good luck with that, but I doubt she’d appreciate it.” She puckered her lips in the parody of a kiss. “I’d be careful of what I consumed, if I were you.”

The idea of Ginny Weasley of all people trying to slip him a love potion was prepostorous. Harry drank his Butterbeer.

“So no one’s managed to get a form?” Pansy went on when he didn’t respond. “I’m paying good galleons for one, don’t forget.”

“If you want me, Pansy,” said Blaise jokingly, “all you have to do is —“

“Ugh,” said Pansy, making an exaggerated face. “No, Blaise. I’ve no interest in being on your list of conquests.”

Blaise pouted, then stole the rest of her drink.

Laughing, Daphne said, “If you grow scales, can I get a commemorative photo?”

As Pansy opened her mouth to retort, Draco leaned over to Harry and said in a low voice, “You probably _should_ be careful of love potions, Potter.”

His breath was warm; Harry could smell his shampoo. “Yeah, I think I’ll be fine,” Harry replied, and, feeling daring, added: “I know what I want.” He pushed Draco gently away.

***

The second lesson with Dumbledore was about as fun as he’d imagined, which was not at all. Harry thought that there was some parallel in Dumbledore’s behaviour towards young Tom Riddle and his attitude towards Harry, but it was difficult to pin down definitively, as after all Riddle had turned into a crazy mass murderer and Harry had no such intentions. On the bright side, it seemed like Dumbledore had (at least temporarily) given up on issuing cryptic warnings and judgements in favour of simple pragmatic lecturing, which Harry tolerated far better.

Despite his hectic schedule, or maybe because of it, he found himself looking forward to Quidditch practices the most, even though the weather was abominable. The team was coming along nicely — Selwyn-Hester was so doggedly enthusiastic that it was rubbing off on the rest of them. (Harry was fighting the urge to ask Selwyn-Hester if the Hat had ever offered him Hufflepuff; Selwyn-Hester had done nothing wrong and did not deserve to be horribly insulted. But still.)

One evening, a few days before the Slytherin-Gryffindor Quidditch match, he came back to the common room to find both Draco and Pansy in a towering rage. The two of them were practically spitting. Apparently, some students from other Houses had spiked several drinks on the Slytherin table during lunch with a custom potion from the mysterious owl-order service, resulting in multiple time-delayed effects that had only become known an hour or so before.

“Six first-years are in the hospital wing,” Pansy recounted with a hideous scowl. “_My_ first-years. Rosier’s grown a pair of bat wings and her feet are three times the size they should be. Whoever did this is going to pay.”

“We have no idea who it was?”

“No,” said Pansy. “And, unfortunately, House points can’t be deducted without a clear target, although Draco did try —“

“That cow crashed into me,” Draco snapped.

“Who?”

“Vane,” replied Pansy, crossing her arms. “A Gryffindor. I don’t think she was behind the spiking … She fell all over Draco and didn’t seem to want to get up.”

“Oh,” Harry said. “Did she, er. Try anything?”

“Don’t be disgusting.” Draco shuddered. “She’s a desperate tart and deserved to lose five hundred points from Gryffindor.”

“He deducted her ten,” explained Pansy. “Since there are limits. And weekly quotas.”

“It’s the thought that counts,” said Draco irritably.

Harry bumped his shoulder into Draco’s in a conciliatory way. “Hey. Look on the bright side. We’ll thrash Gryffindor on Saturday. I promise.”

The tiniest shadow of a smile crossed Draco’s face. “I never doubted, Potter.”

They did win the match, quite thoroughly. Ron was off his game — to put it politely — and though Ginny had the makings of a good Seeker, she was far too distracted by Ron’s performance and spent a good third of her energy and time yelling at him from across the pitch. It didn’t make for good motivation for the Gryffindors. All it really took was a couple of bloodthirsty Bludgers from Greg and Vincent and Harry’s hand closing around the Snitch and the match was in the bag, 410 to 50.

Someone sneaked in three bottles of Blishen’s finest for the after-party, and Harry got well and truly sloshed. The night passed in a blur of fending off Pansy’s drunken advances, followed by resisting his own impulse to do something to Draco, which just sort of resulted in the two of them somehow tangled up together on the floor of their dormitory at three past midnight, arguing with garbled syntax about the Tutshill Tornados, but then thankfully it was suddenly daytime and he hadn’t done anything he’d promised he wouldn’t and if he moved even a little his head was going to split open.

Sleeping on the floor had also annihilated his back. (What was the point of a magic castle if it couldn’t even move him onto a soft mattress when he needed the help?) Greg could be heard snoring on his bed; Draco was already gone. After a few more minutes of denial Harry sat up, groaning, reflecting that one of the many laudable things about living underneath the lake was that the filtered green morning was as gentle as it could be.

And, hello, Draco had left him a vial of Hangover Potion. Its effect was fantastic and immediate; in the absence of the headache he abruptly realised he needed to pee. Since he smelled of Firewhisky, he decided to shower as well, and by the time he was done and had found his wand to cast _Tempus_, it was already past noon.

Well — there would be plenty of time to work and be productive in the evening. He wandered out in the direction of brunch, hungry but unhurried, and was pleasantly surprised to find Draco just outside the doors of the Great Hall, looking perfectly put-together and rather pleased with himself.

“Hey,” Harry said as he walked up. “Thought you’d be working on your Alchemy?”

“Oh, well,” said Draco, shrugging. He was smiling. It was a little — Harry rubbed at his eyes.

“Thanks for the Hangover Potion, by the way,” Harry said, turning into the Hall.

“Wait,” said Draco, grabbing his arm. “Can we — I wanted to talk. Alone.”

“We can’t do it over food?” Harry asked. He peered with concern at Draco’s face, which betrayed no signs of distress. “Is something wro —“

“Oh no no no,” Draco denied quickly. He started pulling on Harry’s arm and moving in the direction of the stairs. “Come on, Harry.”

Something was definitely not right, even if outwardly Draco appeared carefree — especially because he was so carefree; as they wound up a level and Draco ushered them into an unused classroom, Harry feverishly tried to think of everything that could have gone wrong over the course of a night —

“Harry,” Draco was saying, almost breathless. He closed the door. “You won’t believe how much I’ve been thinking about this.”

Frowning slightly, Harry let himself be backed against the wall. “What —“

Draco’s lips closed over his, and it was weird, like he had been sucking on a mint, and then Draco said, “God, I —“

Harry pushed him away so hard he thought he might have popped his shoulder. He snarled, “Who the fuck are you?”

The imposter crashed into a desk and gave a cry of pain. He whimpered, “It’s me, Harry.”

Harry wiped roughly at his mouth and got out his wand. “_Incarcerous_.”

Flailing futilely against the magical ropes, the imposter shrieked, “Stop! Stop it! Harry, it’s me, Draco.”

“Give it up,” Harry said sharply. “It’s Polyjuice, isn’t it?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “What was your goal?” If this was part of another Polyjuiced Death Eater infiltration a la Crouch Jr, Harry was going to — he didn’t know what, exactly, but it would involve violence.

There were tears, now. “I just wanted to —“ sniffling — “Marianne suggested it and I mean how else would I have — I just wanted a _kiss_! I swear to god, and anyway don’t you want to kiss him? You don’t have to overreact so much —“

“Right,” Harry said grimly, cutting him — or her — off. “Neither of us is going to enjoy this, but I’m taking you to see Snape.”

True horror appeared on the mask of Draco’s face then, and it was sickeningly uncanny, because if it had been the real Draco the same emotion would have looked acutely different, Harry was sure of it. The imposter pleaded, “No, please … just untie me and leave, I promise I won’t do it again, Harry, please …”

“Shut up,” Harry said, unsympathetic. “I’m going to cast a Disillusionment Charm on you so that half the school doesn’t see me dragging Malfoy along with ropes. Stay quiet if you know what’s good for you, or I’ll Silence you as well.”

Thankfully, as it was a Sunday, the route back to the dungeons was fairly quiet, and no one stopped Harry to ask why he was marching murderously along while tugging at a patch of air.

And then they reached the door to Snape’s office and Harry realised that he would have to explain to Snape how exactly this situation had come to be, and he almost turned around to enact Plan B, which was find more Firewhisky and skip straight to Monday. But the imposter was making a breathy sort of panicked noise behind him, and if it _did_ turn out to be a stupidly clumsy Death Eater plot after all — he braced himself and knocked.

He heard voices, and there was just enough time for him to realise who else was inside when the door swung open with a spell to reveal both Snape and the real Draco, holding a flask of mercurial liquid.

“Potter,” he said, blinking in surprise.

“Potter,” said Snape in a significantly less friendly tone. “If you have now taken to disturbing Mr Malfoy during his Alchemy consultations then I must advise that you train yourself to be less dependent upon his company.”

“I didn’t even know he was going to be here,” Harry said impatiently. “I thought he had Slughorn today — never mind.” He stepped into the room and yanked the imposter over the threshold. There was gasp followed by a whimper. Both Snape’s and Draco’s eyes narrowed. Harry took a deep breath. “Okay. I’m just going to —“ He undid the Disillusionment. The imposter came into being, partially collapsed on the floor, robes creased, hair a mess.

“What in Salazar’s name,” said Draco, putting the flask down. “Who’s this?”

“That’s what I want to know,” Harry responded, and gave them a brief version of the events.

He wanted to leave out certain details, but the imposter blurted out again, “I just wanted _one_ kiss,” so there was nothing for it. At least Snape definitely did not look like he enjoyed hearing about it.

Draco himself had gone cold and remote at the story. He said, “If it’s Polyjuice, it should be wearing off soon.”

Snape cast a number of spells while they waited. Harry cleared his throat. Draco was silent.

Before long, the white-blond hair darkened and curled, and the shape of the body changed in a queasily fascinating way, and Harry realised he recognised her. It was the Gryffindor girl who’d shown up at the Quidditch tryout and handed him a note, the same one who was always giggling on the periphery whenever he was anywhere near the Gryffindor table at mealtimes.

“You,” said Draco. He wiped his hand against the side of his robe in a rough, aborted motion, as though he wanted to wash himself clean. “I see.” He turned to Harry. “This is the Gryffindor who crashed into me the the day before last.”

“Romilda Vane,” supplied Snape. He flicked his wand; the ropes around her vanished. “Stand up properly.”

She obeyed, looking between the three of them with fear in her eyes.

“Fifty points from Gryffindor,” said Snape, “for the unauthorised use of Polyjuice Potion to impersonate another student. You will have detention weekly for the next four months. This matter will be brought to the Headmaster and your Head of House.” He sneered. “From my thorough knowledge of your potions prowess or, indeed, lack thereof, you did not brew the potion yourself. From whom did you acquire it?”

Barely understandable through the crying, Vane replied, “J-j-just from the, the owl-order e-everyone is using, ju-just for a bit of f-fun! I didn’t mean, didn’t mean to, to —“

“Do not,” intoned Snape, “try to justify your intentions to me. There are more serious matters of concern here than your misplaced teenage crush.” Here he directed an unimpressed look at Harry, then turned back to Vane. “Stop that hideous noise and move. We will proceed to the Headmaster’s office at once.”

Reluctantly, Harry asked, “Do you need me to come as well?”

“Should I require a replay of your clumsy explanation, Potter, I would suffer it alone in a Pensieve,” Snape said disdainfully. He added to Draco, “Stabilise the solution and decant it. We shall continue when I return.” And with a flick of his black robes he was gone, propelling Romilda Vane in front of him by sheer force of intimidation.

“Right,” Harry said, as the door clicked closed. “So.” He cleared his throat again.

Draco already had his back turned, full attention apparently concentrated on the flask. But after about a minute or two he said, “What did I tell you? You need to be careful.”

Maybe _Draco_ needed to not have his hair stolen, Harry didn’t say, because it wasn’t Draco’s fault. Instead he replied, “It was pretty obvious, pretty quickly. She didn’t get much of a kiss in, don’t worry.”

Draco took a completely empty flask from a cabinet just to bang it with undue force on the table. The glass cracked. He cast _Reparo_ on it, then did it again. “Why would I worry?”

“Er,” Harry said, walking tentatively closer. “I don’t know, Malfoy. Why would you?” He rescued the flask before it could be ruined a third time and returned it to its place. “Are you angry at me?”

“No,” Draco said, extremely fast. Then he repeated it, slower: “No, I’m not.”

“Are you in a ‘five hundred points from Gryffindor’ sort of mood?”

“I’m in a ‘that could have been a real danger’ sort of mood,” Draco answered, mocking Harry’s intonation a little. “While I wouldn’t conjure even a teaspoon of water if Vane were on fire — it’s not that. If Polyjuice is going to be so commonplace, we have to be on our guard.”

“I know,” Harry said. Then, because he felt tired, and to prove that he could, he put his forehead on Draco’s shoulder, sighing.

“I’m trying to work,” Draco complained, but stayed very still.

“Are you going to be here all day?” Harry asked, quietly, and kept leaning against him for a lingering moment. “What about lunch?” To highlight the point, his stomach rumbled.

Draco got a hand in Harry’s hair, then used it to ease him away. “Do you know how much wheedling I had to do to get Professor Snape to give me extra one-on-one help with this solution?”

“None at all, because you’re the only student he actually likes?”

“Far too much, because it takes effort to be teacher’s pet.” The hand descended to the back of his neck, intimate, and then drew back to give a business-like slap to his upper arm. “Go eat.” A hint of laughter: “Train yourself out of this dependency, Potter.”

“Yeah, yeah, Malfoy. See you later.”

***

Romilda Vane was not the only person to use Polyjuice. Most of it took the form of silly pranking, and Harry fully expected the fad to wear out sooner rather than later, but to his surprise it went on and on, along with the love potions. In fact, as they descended into December there were more and more incidents, which, aside from affording Filch more excuses to harrass students in the corridors, meant that people began to develop code words to prove their identity, and to surreptitiously check the integrity of their drinks with spells at each meal. No one wanted to be the next spontaneous love confession, or to be tricked with a false face. The worst thing was that if it had ever been funny, it no longer was; instead, there was only increasing tension and mistrust. Finally, Snape rounded up all the Slytherins two weeks before Christmas and informed them crisply that anyone stupid enough to be caught with owl-order products would be summarily expelled.

Harry was, frankly, relieved, until he realised that it didn’t actually mean that the problem had been solved. What it meant was that they had advanced to the next level. To begin with, most of the owl-orders had been hoarded by the other three Houses, Gryffindor in particular. Now that the administration was bearing down with its full authority and threatening expulsion, the game had become serious. Some Hufflepuffs panicked and began to sell their remaining order forms, and that started the avalanche.

“Ten more,” said Pansy, putting her legs up on a stool by the fire. “Idiot gave them to me for seven sickles.”

“Yeah, okay,” said Harry, copying her posture, “but Pans: whoever’s selling must know the situation in Hogwarts; they’re aware most of the forms are in Slytherin hands now, even if the service is set up to be anonymous. And they were obviously avoiding Slytherins before.”

The common room wall slid open; Draco came in, yawning. It was midnight.

“What if they send you poison back?” Harry continued, as Draco saw them and came over to sit down next to Harry, still yawning massively.

Pansy smirked. “Money is money. And anyway, I already bought some a week ago, back when the Gryffindors were still ordering. Came in this morning. Three vials of Polyjuice, one love potion, and one case of Instant Peruvian Darkness Powder.”

“What’s that?” Harry asked.

“Exactly what it sounds like,” Pansy replied. “Granted, I don’t know if it’ll ever be useful. I wanted another love potion, but they were out of stock.”

“How’s a love potion useful?” scoffed Harry.

“Used correctly,” said Draco unexpectedly, “it can mean twenty-four hours of complete distraction on your chosen target.”

“For revenge,” Pansy said, at the same time.

“That, too,” conceded Draco, yawning again. He said, “Three vials of Polyjuice. I’ll buy them off you, Parkinson. Name your price.”

“Get your own, Draco.”

“What about the Darkness Powder?”

Pansy considered. “Two galleons, and a deluxe box of Helmond’s Molten Chocolate.”

“Done.”

“You have more forms,” Harry pointed out to Pansy.

“And you were just telling me they might have no returns,” Pansy responded. “Besides, they’re low on Polyjuice as well, and that takes ages to brew. I’m hoarding the forms.”

“What do _you_ want Polyjuice for?” Harry asked of Draco.

Instead of answering properly, Draco said pensively, “Maybe I’ll buy some elsewhere, then.”

Pansy yawned as well. “You can’t have mine. Morgana, just looking at you makes me feel utterly exhausted.” She got up, stretching. “I’m going to bed.”

Once they were alone, Harry repeated his question. “What d’you want Polyjuice for?”

Even half-asleep, Draco affected mild scorn well. “So I can pretend to be you and play in the next Quidditch match. Or: because it might be useful in a war, Harry, you dolt. And because I was thinking Mother might take advantage of it, if she hasn’t thought of it already. We used to have a store in the Manor, but …” His face shuttered momentarily. “I’ll write to her; she might be able to acquire some from the apothecaries while they’re still open.”

Uneasily, Harry remembered all of the boarded-up windows in Diagon Alley. “You’re right. I should’ve thought of that.”

Draco was staring at the fire, unfocused. “Did you know, if you die while Polyjuiced, your body never reverts back to your own?”

“I did,” Harry said. “Crouch’s mother died wearing his face in Azkaban.” Dumbledore had told him that.

“It poses some interesting questions regarding the interaction of body, magic and potion,” Draco continued, as though he were talking to himself. “Periclysus’ Theorem. I was just reading about it, for Alchemy. It’s the reason why potions don’t work on Muggles, or sometimes just kills them instantly.”

“Well, it’s like how magical items don’t work for them either, right?” Harry said. “Like there’s no electricity to power the machine.” A Muggle could hold a Remembrall, but it would never change colour, even if they had forgotten everything they’d ever known.

“Eleck-tri-city,” repeated Draco with care. “No, not exactly. Potions have innate magic of their own, so you could reasonably expect the simpler ones to work on a non-magical body, but they don’t. There’s a more complex interaction —“ he yawned again — “like, like the interaction between wizard and wand. In fact, the construction of a wand resembles the divide proposed in the theorem: wood, length and core. There are prime ratios that describe the most optimum and therefore common constructions. Two-five-seven, for example.” He scrubbed at his eyes. “Are you following?”

“Not really,” Harry admitted, a smile tugging on his lips. “But go on.”


	18. Chapter 18

Harry invited Pansy to Slughorn’s Christmas party. Draco, defying all expectations and natural laws of the universe, invited Selwyn-Hester.

“He wanted to go,” Draco said when questioned. “This way, he owes me a favour.” He put his book down and raised his brows. “You should’ve invited him, Potter. Some Quidditch Captain you are. Anyway,” he added, “his lineage has some interesting British-Austrian connections Slughorn is overlooking.”

Harry couldn’t care less about about Selwyn-Hester’s connections. What he did care to know was if Draco Malfoy had been placed on the planet specifically to torture him, but he had a feeling no one had the answer to that mystery.

“Oh yes,” said Selwyn-Hester enthusiastically on the night of the party when they met at the drinks table. “Great-Grandmama is English: it was her idea that I attend Hogwarts. Our main estate is in Vienna, and to tell you the truth, I’d move back there sooner rather than later. We weren’t expecting so much political upheaval, you see.”

“Uh huh,” Harry said.

“You’re welcome to visit in future, if you like.” Selwyn-Hester clinked his glass of Gillywater amiably against Harry’s pumpkin juice. “We have a midair Quidditch pitch with Anti-Muggle Repellant Charms way above the city. It has a beautiful view, though you might have a more difficult time spotting the Snitch through all the visual noise.”

“Harry, my boy!” boomed Slughorn’s voice, before Harry could reply. For a man of his size, Slughorn could certainly move fast. His hand came clapping down on Harry’s shoulder. “Have I introduced you to Eldred Worple yet? No? Come, come, there are so many guests here tonight whom you _must_ meet …”

Nodding at Selwyn-Hester, Harry allowed himself to be spirited away, and spent the next half-hour diligently shaking hands with vampire hunters, vampires, Myron Wagtail of the Weird Sisters, the inventor of Omnioculars, a wizard with selkie blood, and an Egyptian alchemist who was more interested in speaking with Draco (rightly so) about solvents.

“Having fun?” Harry asked under his breath.

Draco was smiling at the alchemist, obviously engrossed, but he looked over briefly and said indulgently, “Potter,” then, seeing something to the left of Harry’s head, murmured in a warning tone, “Look sharp. Your unfinished business decided to attend.”

“My what…?” Harry turned around.

Hermione had entered, accompanied by Padma Patil. On the other side of the room, Pansy, who was chatting with Sanguini the vampire, visibly stiffened.

Though Slughorn had been eager to add Hermione to the Slug Club, she’d never shown up to any of the dinners thus far. She looked tremendously uncomfortable now; judging by the way Patil was steering her by the elbow, this new development was not her idea.

“Hey, Hermione!” called Ron loudly from his position at the buffet table. (In complete contrast to Hermione, Ron had gone to every dinner and stuffed his face at each one; Slughorn seemed to lose conviction in Ron’s aptitude for potions and suitability for the Club with every meal.)

Harry looked back at Draco. Draco made a minute shooing gesture.

“Fine,” Harry muttered to himself. “Why not.”

Ron was getting Hermione to sample some of the finger food when Harry approached. Patil had already vanished, presumably to mingle.

“Hi Ron,” Harry said, then braced himself. “Hermione.”

Hermione put the canapé down without eating it. She crossed her arms and stared across the room, her mouth a flat line, then finally met his eyes. “Harry.”

Ron swallowed whatever he’d been chewing on. “Hey Harry.”

“I wanted to apologise,” Harry said rigidly, “for — um. At Madam Malkin’s. I shouldn’t have pushed you like that. I — I overreacted.”

“Did you?” Hermione said, like he had handed her an essay and she was correcting his grammar.

Harry put down his drink. “I did. But let me be clear: I’m _only_ apologising for pushing you. I’m not sorry for any of the rest of it.”

Hermione stared at him without speaking. A muscle twitched in her cheek. Ron looked between them, and when the silence only stretched, said with exasperation, “Oh for Merlin’s sake, Hermione, take it. You said yourself that —“

“_Fine_,” Hermione cut in. She uncrossed her arms; took a deep breath. “Fine. I’m sorry, too. For drawing conclusions when I didn’t know the whole story.” Her expression became accusing. “You never told me.”

“Because it’s none of your business,” Harry said.

“Fine,” Hermione said again. “All right.”

“So,” Harry tried, uncertain. “Can we … How are you?”

“Busy,” she answered tersely.

“Okay,” he said carefully.

Robotically: “What about you?”

“Yeah, busy. I guess.”

“You’ve been having private lessons with Dumbledore, haven’t you?” asked Ron lightly.

“What are you talking about?” Harry said, wiping his face clean of expression.

“Oh don’t bother, Harry,” Hermione snapped. “We saw you on the Map.”

“Oi,” Ron hissed. “Fred and George said to keep it a secret.”

“What map?” Harry looked between the two of them, then remembered something Sirius had said. “The Marauder’s Map?”

“That’s right,” Hermione replied, ignoring Ron.

“It shows you where everyone in the castle is?”

“Yes,” answered Hermione. “So you needn’t pretend.”

“You’ve been _stalking_ me?” Surely not.

Ron put his hands up. “Mate, leave me out of this. It’s a cool map and all, but that’s creepy.”

“It’s useful,” Hermione said defensively.

“Hang on,” Harry said, thinking fast. “Does it see through Polyjuice?”

Immediately, he could tell from her face that it did.

“I see,” he said.

“Oh yeah,” Ron said, eating an eclair. “We heard about Romilda Vane. Sorry about that. She’s a bit — I mean, did she really…?” He was a little pink around the ears.

“She Polyjuiced into Draco,” Harry told him, not wanting to get into it. Then he realised what Ron had said. “Why are you sorry? Don’t tell me you’re —“ he glared at them suspiciously — “are _you_ behind the owl-orders?”

“No!” Ron denied instantly. “Of course not. Hermione’s only, I mean.” He cleared his throat and looked at Hermione apologetically.

“It’s not my initiative,” Hermione said after a pause. “As for whose it is, as you like to say: it’s none of your business. Although,” she added with a more guilty air, “the Polyjuice wasn’t meant to … well. I regret how it spread.”

Harry considered asking her just how far she regretted it, but they were inching dangerously close to ‘Marietta Edgecomb’s face’ territory, so he backed off. He confessed instead, “You’re correct; I’ve been getting private lessons from Dumbledore.”

“Has he been teaching you super advanced spells?” Ron asked, eyes lighting up in a way that was not boyish, not like they once might have, but instead with an almost calculating glint. It’d been nearly a year since they’d buried Arthur Weasley.

Harry shrugged awkwardly. “No. Er. Mostly it’s just been — information. But I mean … Listen. I don’t think it’s anything I can just share. Sorry.”

“But you’ve told Malfoy,” Hermione stated.

Harry looked a challenge at her. “Are we doing this again? Already?”

Hermione had a hand balled in the fabric of her robe, and as he noticed it he thought tiredly that he must’ve been too naively hopeful to imagine that they could try to move on, but then to his utter astonishment the hand relaxed and Hermione relented, saying, in a voice he hadn’t heard in a long time, “God, Harry. Please just be careful. I’m worried.”

“I know you are,” he told her. “So am I. I’m … I don’t want to fight.”

“I don’t either.” She was glaring at the table cloth. “I only want to help you.”

“I need you to,” he said, sincerely. “I want to — to help you, too. Can we do that?”

She smiled. It was barely there, but at once he felt lighter. He hurried to smile back, so that when she glanced up at him and said, “We can,” he could catch the words and hold them safe.

***

He returned to Number Twelve Grimmauld Place for the holidays, partly because he now had a duty to the house, and partly because Narcissa, as a member of the Order, also now had access and could consequently visit with Draco. It was very strange, inviting them to stay when they in some ways had more claim to the property than he did, but Kreacher had done well in his absence and every room was welcoming. The house even presented Narcissa with her old bedroom, popping its door into existence with a self-congratulatory attitude as she stepped onto the third floor landing after Harry and Draco.

“How lovely,” Narcissa commented, touching the wallpaper of the corridor, which at some point had changed into a pleasant sea-green pattern, like the lakewater outside Slytherin on sunny days.

“I preferred a darker scheme myself,” remarked Walburga from a landscape painting.

Narcissa walked slowly to her bedroom door. “It looks the same.”

“Of course it does, dear,” replied Walburga; for some reason, she sounded tremendously sad.

The appearance of Narcissa had Kreacher in an excellent mood; he looked almost like a young elf again when Harry called him on the first evening to ask after the state of affairs.

“Nothing to worry about, Master Potter,” he said, bowing. “All is being well.”

“No issues with any Order members?”

“A thief in the night, only,” came the reply. “A thief, oh yes, but Kreacher caught him, and warned him, and he won’t come again.”

“A thief?” Harry repeated, alarmed. “Who was it? How did they get under the Fidelius?”

“They knew the secret, Master Potter. The thief was a member of the Order, but on the run now, and never to return. Kreacher made sure of that. Kreacher does not know the thief’s name, and Kreacher will dip his hands in a pot of boiling oil for this error.”

“No oil dipping necessary,” Harry said hurriedly. “But if you ever come across him again — I want to know, okay?”

Kreacher bowed once more. “Of course, Master Potter.” He disappeared with a crack.

On Christmas Eve they had dinner in the courtyard. Somehow, Narcissa had coaxed it into summer, with an ancient fig tree heavy with fruit, fragrant and warm. Winter snow fell down from above and vanished before it could touch the ground.

They ate at a circular table in the centre, and the conversation was dominated by the high society talk Narcissa was partial to, with no hint of her work for the Order. A Parisian designer was attempting to popularise a new style of cut for witch’s robes; a 12th century sculpture of a _nerzarc_ previously thought to be lost had been discovered encased in ice in Greenland. No mention at all of Lucius.

Later that night, after Narcissa had gone to bed and it was just the two of them lying by the sitting room fireplace, Draco said, “I think it’s Dementors.”

“Dementors?”

“Whatever Mother won’t talk about, whatever she’s working on or found out. It’s to do with Dementors. She said something in a letter, about how I should practise conjuring a Patronus daily. And then in the next one she said the same thing. She doesn’t usually repeat herself.”

“Voldemort has all the Dementors, doesn’t he?” Harry asked.

“Don’t say the name. Yes.”

“It’s good advice. Practising your Patronus, I mean.” Harry sort of missed their ‘study group.’

“_Expecto Patronum_.” A bright silver light blossomed.

It took a long time to fade. “You’ve improved.”

“It’s inconsistent.”

“Does Narcissa have a Patronus?”

“She told me that it takes the form of a crane. I’ve never seen her cast it.”

Harry turned on his side. “Draco.”

“Yeah?”

“You’ll get there.”

“Don’t patronise me, Potter,” Draco replied. But he added after a moment: “I will.”

***

The next morning, after a normal breakfast, Draco sat Harry down on the couch, then left and returned with what looked like a glass of pale blue milk and a bezoar. He put both on the coffee table.

“I’m not sure about the taste,” he said, “but try it.”

“Er,” said Harry. “What’s the bezoar for?”

“In case I messed up and it turns out to be poisonous,” Draco replied matter-of-factly.

“Is this a potions experiment of yours? Something you thought of while buried in alchemy books?”

“Maybe?” Draco tapped his hands on his knees and looked expectant.

Doubtfully, Harry picked up the glass and swirled it a little.

“I’m ninety-nine point nine percent certain that all of the elements combined together are benign even if the intended effect doesn’t manifest,” Draco assured him. “Also, I ran it by Professor Snape and he seemed disappointed that it wouldn’t give you a painful death.”

“You consulted Snape about my Christmas present,” said Harry disbelievingly. Draco just smirked. Harry resigned himself to being a guinea pig. “All right. Here goes.” He drank it all in one gulp. It tasted a little bit like — he smacked his lips — like the pancake batter Aunt Petunia used to make him cook for Dudley. When no one was looking, he’d stick his fingers into the pan to jealously sample the sweetness.

“How do you feel?” Draco asked, taking the empty glass.

Blinking, Harry replied, “A bit … dizzy?”

“Take off your glasses.”

Harry did so; Draco bent close, peering at him.

Then Harry realised: “I can see.”

Everything was crystal clear; he could even see out of the sitting room door to the end of the hallway, where there was Rococo-era detailing on one of the portrait frames. He hadn’t been able to see the stylised leaves so crisply from that distance even with his glasses.

“It’s only temporary, of course,” Draco was saying excitedly. “But I thought — well. Do you like it?”

Harry looked around the whole room, then touched his eyes. “To be honest, I feel kind of naked without my glasses.”

“I agree that by now they’re a part of your —“ Draco waved a hand — “face, or whatever.” He glanced away. “I don’t mean to imply that I don’t like your stupid glasses — I mean. I just thought it might be interesting.”

“It’s — yeah. Wow, Draco. Did you come up with it yourself?”

“There were existing formulae, but with some out of proportion side-effects. All I did was try to improve them.”

Beaming at him, Harry said, “Thanks.” They were really very close.

“You do look really weird like this,” Draco declared, standing up hastily and going around to the other side of the table.

Harry let him go without protest. Possibly, he was remembering the last time Harry hadn’t worn his glasses and they had been so close. Harry certainly was. He said, “Now my turn. Kreacher!”

With a small pop, the tray appeared on the table. Draco gasped.

“Sometimes, I pay attention when you ramble about your Alchemy project,” Harry said with a touch of smugness.

“I thought they froze the exports because of a low harvest!”

“Not through the Muggle channels. I did some research; sometimes there are mutations amongst the regular plants. They look rotten in the absence of magic, so the Muggles usually throw them out.”

The six True Ghost Peppers gleamed red and translucent, giving off heat. Through their thick skin you could see the golden seeds, shimmering. It had taken Harry weeks of searching before he had been lucky enough to liaison with a Squib living in Northeast India, and then more days to connect through the Squib to Muggle contacts, who were thoroughly confused about why he wanted specifically rotten produce. And then he’d been forced to use Muggle transportation for a part of the journey due to the export freeze. The parcel had only just arrived two days before.

“Since we can’t eat these ones,” Harry said into Draco’s silent amazement, “I also got two of the normal ghost peppers. Er, how do you say it — bhut jolokia.” On cue, another tray appeared with two more chillis, this time perfectly solid.

Draco barked a laugh. “You want to eat them raw?”

“Scared, Malfoy?”

The bezoar turned out to be useful after all. Harry was too distracted by the agony in his internal organs and the process of secreting every drop of moisture in his body through his nose, tear glands and pores, but Draco miraculously had the presence of mind to split the stone in half with a spell and shove it down their throats.

“Oh my _god_,” Harry said, noting a little distantly that he was on the floor. “Fuck.”

“Thanks for the incredibly rare ingredients,” gasped Draco beside him, “but Merlin, Potter, I’m not doing that again. Muggles eat this and live?”

“Apparently?”

They lay there crying (or, more accurately, leaking) involuntarily for another quarter of an hour. Eventually, Harry felt recovered enough to angle himself upward and rasp a Cleaning Charm over them both. Even so, Draco looked a mess, and Harry assumed that he himself probably wasn’t any better.

Grinning, he asked, “Fancy a game of Catch-the-Snitch?” He thought he had even better chances than usual, considering how well he could see.

“Oh, fuck you,” Draco said, as if he had used Legilimency and read Harry’s mind, but he sat up. “Best of five.”

***

Harry was winning two to one when Kreacher materialised below them, saying, “Master Potter, the Minister for Magic is here to see you.”

“Sorry?” Harry called, angling his Firebolt around. “What’d you say?”

“Ha!” Draco exclaimed, taking advantage of Harry’s confusion to catch the Snitch.

“Kreacher repeats, the Minister for Magic is here to see you.”

Landing, Harry said, “You’re sure it’s the Minister? As in, Scrimgeour? How can he be here, if the house is under Fidelius?”

“The Minister cannot see this residence, as Master says, but has sent a proxy to relay his message,” Kreacher explained. “Otherwise, Kreacher would have shown the Minister into the drawing room, as is customary.”

Draco landed as well. “Who’s the proxy? And where’s Mother?”

“Auror Rinesmith is waiting on Master’s response in the guest room.” The ‘guest room’ was what Kreacher called the long narrow room that the Order of the Phoenix used primarily for their meetings. “Mistress Narcissa has errands to run, and is elsewhere.”

“All right,” said Harry. “I guess I’ll go see him. But I need a shower first. I’ll be fast.”

“You can take your time,” Draco disagreed. “They’re the ones calling on a holiday.” He said to Kreacher, “Tell Rinesmith to tell Scrimgeour that Harry will join them once he is ready. Have them both wait outside.”

Kreacher looked at Harry. Harry nodded.

Once Kreacher had gone, Draco crowed, “Ha! That’s a draw, Potter.”

The Snitch was struggling in his hand. Harry rolled his eyes. “Sure, Malfoy.”

He showered quickly and dressed in fresh robes. He’d assumed that Draco had gone to clean up as well, but no: Draco was in the sitting room, still dishevelled, wearing dragonhide gloves and examining the True Ghost Peppers. He glanced up when Harry stopped on the threshold.

“Much better,” he said approvingly.

“You’re not coming?” Harry asked.

“I don’t think that would be prudent, no.” The golden seeds shone little flecks of light onto Draco’s cheeks. “Maybe next time, if you don’t mess this up.” He paused for effect. “Don’t mess it up.”

***

Harry was almost certain that he was going to mess it up, but he was pleasantly surprised to find that Scrimgeour was practically bending over backward to accommodate him. This was obvious as soon as they met, because Scrimgeour said nothing about being made to wait outside on a Muggle street on a teenager’s convenience, and instead dived straight into an introduction:

“I’ve wanted to meet you for a very long time, Mr Potter.” He offered Harry his hand and his famous lion’s smile. It was possibly the most assertive handshake Harry had ever experienced. “Rufus Scrimgeour, pleased to make your acquaintance. I was in Slytherin House, just as you are.”

“Ah,” Harry said. That made sense. “Pleased to meet you, too. Call me Harry. I’m sorry to have kept you waiting.”

“Not at all, not at all,” Scrimgeour assured him. “I hope you don’t mind my intrusion on a day of festivities? Good old Rinesmith here was understanding enough to agree to assist me in contacting you.” Behind them, Rinesmith stood alert, looking up and down the street for threats. Percy Weasley was there, too, a thick briefcase in hand but otherwise motionless and expressionless. Scrimgeour went on, “Shall we relocate, since you cannot invite me inside?”

“Sure,” Harry said. “There’s a small park down this way.”

“Oh,” said Scrimgeour. “I was thinking of something a little more private, if you don’t mind?”

At this, Percy Weasley set the briefcase on the ground and opened it. It expanded quite impressively to reveal a wooden staircase leading down to a cozy warm glow. The pleasant smell of something freshly baked wafted up.

“I assure you, it’s quite safe. Newest model of compact wizarding space, state of the art. Has every kind of warding on it to prevent interaction with unauthorised persons,” Scrimgeour explained. An elderly Muggle shuffled past them on the pavement, completely oblivious to their presence. “I’ll go first, shall I?”

“Er,” Harry said, trying to remain polite. “No offence, but no. It seems like it could be a wonderful place to have a chat, Minister, but it also seems like it could be a perfect way to abduct me.” He thought of Romilda Vane. “How do I know you’re who you say you are?”

Scrimgeour frowned. It was an intimidating look, but he only sounded thoughtful when he spoke, “Do you not recognise Rinesmith?”

“I do,” Harry admitted. “But he could be under Imperius.”

“Well, you’re certainly duly vigilant,” Scrimgeour said. “So be it. We’ll stay outside. As for my identity, I suppose we could travel all the way over to the Ministry itself, assuming that you won’t trust a Side-Along — plenty of people would be able to confirm who I am for you there, but that would not be discreet.” He scratched at his chin.

Percy Weasley came to Scrimgeour’s rescue. He said pompously to Harry, “This is definitely the Minister for Magic, Potter. I will confirm it. You stayed at my parents’ house, the Burrow, during the summer between your third and fourth year at Hogwarts, following the disturbance at the Quidditch World Cup. You kept to yourself and spent a lot of your time up near the attic. I found you there one night when it was time for dinner. You said that you liked it up there because it was quiet. It wasn’t, actually, because of the ghoul’s wailing, but I thought it best to accept your excuse. On account of this information, do you believe sufficiently that I am Percy Weasley, and that I am of a sound mind? I can provide further evidence if necessary.”

There was a lengthy pause. “Yeah, okay,” Harry acknowledged. “You’re Percy, all right.” Percy made a gesture towards the open briefcase; Harry held up a hand in denial. “But I’m still not going in there.”

“Then we will walk to the park,” Scrimgeour said. “Rinesmith, if you would.”

Rinesmith removed what seemed like a box of matchsticks from an inner robe pocket. He took one out and lit it; a flame hissed into being. Harry squinted; the flame’s colour was difficult to describe — it had a mix of green, pink and yellow, but was primarily white. It looked less like fire and more like what a faceted crystal looked like when you shone a beam of light through it.

“Something from the Department of Mysteries,” Scrimgeour informed him. “That should give us some cover as long as it’s burning.” He waved forward. “Shall we?”

The park was only five minutes away. Muggles continued to ignore them. It had snowed overnight, but everything was already a dreary brown and grey slush. When they reached the park, it was empty save for a shivering man waiting for his dog to do its business.

“I’m sure I don’t have to explain to you what a time of uncertainty we’re living in,” Scrimgeour began, as the dog finished and the man got out a bag. “All these rumours … whisperings of the ‘Chosen One.’ Of course, I’m not saying that you _are_ the Chosen One, but public opinion, Harry — it’s a powerful thing.”

“I’m aware, Minister,” Harry said easily.

“Then you must also understand the messy position the Ministry is in, what with that scandal with Dolores Umbridge last year, and your own article in the _Daily Prophet_. There’s fear rising all over the country, Harry.”

“How is Umbridge?” Harry asked, curious. There had been no further mention of her in the press at all.

“She’s been demoted,” Scrimgeour replied succinctly.

“Not sacked?”

“I’m afraid not.” The man and his dog jogged off together. “She’s very efficient at her job, and we need efficiency.”

“She’s not good for your image,” Harry said. “To put it mildly.”

“She won’t be in the public eye again for a long time, if ever.” Scrimgeour adjusted his robes and cleared his throat. “You seem to be a very understanding young man. May I be direct with you, Harry?”

“That would be helpful, Minister.”

“The people need hope, and hope is built from symbols. Now, once again, I don’t know if you really are the Chosen One, and I wouldn’t expect you to divulge such confidences even if you knew, but it would be helpful if you would work with us to build — a symbol of hope, if you will. It would give us all a good solid base to bolster the country. Give everyone a boost.”

Harry chose his words carefully. “That all makes sense to me, Minister, but — well. I’m hesitant to give you my unconditional support. Consider Umbridge again, for instance. That’s still fresh in everyone’s memory. I’d rather not be tied to her and the sort of illegal activities she undertook. You’ve reassured me that she is no longer in the public eye, and I believe you, but there are other Umbridges, aren’t there?”

The matchstick burnt out. Rinesmith lit another. As it flared, bright and ethereal, a different sort of shine entered Scrimgeour’s eyes. “I knew that a conversation with you would be time well spent, Harry. Absolutely, you make a fair point. I would not presume to ask for your unconditional support. Only, perhaps, your continued consideration. If you would, oh, just pop in to the Ministry once in a while, that would be enough. And while you’re there, you would have ample opportunity to make your own observations, and if something is not to your liking, my office is always open. We both, after all, want the best for the Wizarding World.”

“Of course,” Harry said. A touch of cold landed on his forehead; it had started snowing again. “May I ask you a question, Minister?”

“Please.”

“Do you believe that Voldemort has returned, more powerful than ever?”

For the first time since they had met, the geniality fell completely from Scrimgeour’s voice, and Harry saw the man who had been Head Auror in all his ferocity. “I do, Harry. No ounce of doubt. And he must be stopped.”

“Then,” Harry said, turning and holding out his hand, “I believe we can work together.”

This time, when they shook, Harry made sure to squeeze just as hard.

***

He was feeling fairly accomplished when he opened the door to Grimmauld Place, shaking the snow from his hair and calling loudly, “I’m back!” He got no response, so he checked the sitting room. “Draco?”

Kreacher materialised at his side. “Draco is in the library, Master Potter.”

“Thanks,” Harry said, and bounded up the stairs. The door to the library was wide open, and he could hear voices from inside.

“Positively dreadful,” murmured Walburga’s voice, as Harry emerged from the bookshelves to the reading area.

He began to say, “Hey, so —“ and stopped dead in his tracks.

Draco was lounging on one of the chairs, a pile of alchemy books by his side. He had clearly showered, but instead of dressing in his robes, he’d put on one of Harry’s t-shirts and a pair of Harry’s old jeans. He’d thrown a jumper on top, too — literally thrown it on, like it was a blanket.

“What,” Harry said flatly.

“I’m glad you agree,” said Walburga from a small frame propped up on one of the tables. “Draco, think of how frightful it would be for Narcissa.”

“Mother won’t mind,” Draco said, in the tones of one who had said the same thing twenty times already and did not particularly care in that moment if he were lying. He waved at Harry. “How’d it go?”

“How’d —“ Harry gaped. “It went fine. Great. Wonderfully. What are you wearing?”

“I should hope that you would recognise your own wardrobe, Potter. You don’t mind, do you?”

“No,” Harry said slowly, drawing out the syllable to give his brain time to function. “Did you forget to bring an extra set of robes?”

“As if the house of my forefathers could not produce appropriate attire for its children had they a need for it,” Walburga said scathingly.

“You wear these, from time to time,” explained Draco. “I always wondered, so I decided to try them out. I didn’t know they were so comfortable.”

“Um.” Harry did not know how to say that the clothes did not fit him at all. The t-shirt, while not one of Dudley’s hand-me-downs, was still too big on Draco’s frame, and the jeans were too loose on his hips, too loose in general. In robes, Draco Malfoy always somehow looked every inch the aristocrat, even when he hadn’t slept properly for a week; in untailored and oversized Muggle clothes, he looked — sort of like a bookish prig who didn’t know how to dress, and who probably got picked on by larger boys.

“Spit it out, Potter, before you choke on it.”

“Oh my god,” Harry said, putting his face in his hands. “Do you — are you interested in Muggle clothes? Because — I’m not an expert, mind — but I can take you shopping for —“ he gestured helplessly — “something that, er. Complements you better.”

“In my time,” volunteered Walburga, “I was aware that the Muggles wore something called waistcoats.”

“Yeah!” Harry said, snapping his fingers. “We could get you a waistcoat. Like, a three-piece. With a waistcoat. As one of the pieces. That could work.”

Draco looked a little sulky. “I only tried them on on a whim, Potter. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

“Do you —“ Harry went and sat on the chair next to him — “er. Did you want to wear the jumper, too?”

But the jumper only made it worse. Harry was sorely tempted to _Accio_ his glasses up from where he’d left them in the sitting room to give to Draco to complete the picture. He didn’t, to preserve his sanity, and also because it would have given him away. For some reason, seeing Draco wearing Harry’s clothes in the context of an ancient magical library that offered a view of the galaxy was thoroughly devastating.

Then he realised that Draco was neither a blushing maiden nor a total idiot, which meant that it was possible Draco knew exactly what it was doing to Harry, and furthermore had done it on purpose.

He must have suddenly looked suspicious, because Draco asked, “What now?”

“Nothing,” Harry said quickly. “Never mind. You just look very weird.”

“_You_ always look very weird, wearing these,” retorted Draco. “So I don’t see why I’m not allowed.”

Harry leaned back in the chair and sighed, giving up. “Suit yourself.”

There was a disgusted noise from the direction of the frame, and when Harry glanced over the painting was newly empty.

Draco changed the subject. “Tell me properly about your talk with Scrimgeour. You said it went well?”

“I think so,” Harry said, and recounted the conversation.

“I hope you enjoy long luncheons with politicians,” Draco commented when he finished, “because you’ll be getting invitations soon.”

“It’s all right, I’m a Slug Club veteran,” Harry joked. “I’ll handle it.”

“They usually hold one for New Year’s. Mother and Fa —“ Draco paused, tilted his head to the ceiling, blinking — “Mother and Father used to go every year.”

Harry, who had spent more than one Christmas and New Year’s holiday at Malfoy Manor, said gently, “I remember.”

They sat silently for a moment, before Draco sighed and said in a different voice, “You should take Granger with you to the luncheon. So it’ll look less like Slytherin propaganda.”

“Hermione isn’t a prop,” Harry told him sternly.

“Of course she isn’t,” Draco agreed easily. “_You’re_ the prop, in this case. Ask her. She’ll say yes; she’s far too ruthless and ambitious to give up the opportunity to mingle with the Ministry elite.”

“Malfoy. Was that you complimenting her?”

Draco made a face. “Don’t get used to it.”

Laughing, Harry said, “Okay, I’ll ask her, as long as this luncheon or whatever is actually happening, and I’m actually invited.”

“It will, and you will be,” Draco said.

But he was wrong. The luncheon never happened, and Harry never received an invitation, because as the sun rose over the new year, the Ministry’s collapse began.


	19. Chapter 19

On the morning of January the 1st, during breakfast, a horned owl arrived with a hastily wrapped package. It contained a box of matches and a letter written on Ministry stationery bearing the official insignia, although the parchment was ripped and the handwriting untidy. It read:

_Harry,_

_What I feared has come to pass, too fast. Do not trust anything you receive from the Ministry. Consider our agreement void, as I cannot uphold my end of the bargain. Enclosed please find a supply of Verignis — flame that will burn away deception. Very recent invention from the Unspeakables. You may recall my use of it at our meeting. May it be of use to you._

_Yours in haste,_   
_R. Scrimgeour_

The name was scrawled so hurriedly it was barely legible.

“What on earth,” Harry said. He handed Draco the letter. Narcissa watched them closely, sensing that something was wrong.

“How can we be sure that it’s from Scrimgeour?” Draco asked.

“I do recognise the matches.” Harry slid the box open. “I suppose I can light one to check that it’s the same …”

Just as he was about to, they heard the door to Number Twelve open, and from the hall came Lupin’s voice: “Harry! Are you there?”

“In here,” Harry called, getting up.

There was a crash, and Tonks could be heard saying, “Ouch — no, I’m fine, sorry, didn’t know that was there —“

“Harry.” Lupin appeared at the doorway to the sun room. His robes, if anything, looked even more bedraggled than usual, as if he had slept in them. “Good, you’re all here. Hello Draco, Narcissa.” He swept in and peered out the window, every line of his body filled with tension. “We’ve come to take you back to Hogwarts.”

“What,” Harry said, alarmed, “right now?”

“Right now,” Tonks affirmed. Her hair was a sombre grey. “Wotcha, cousin. Aunt Narcissa.”

“What’s happened?” Narcissa asked, putting down her teacup.

“Order’s meeting soon,” Lupin said by way of answer. “Dumbledore will fill us in.” He turned back to Harry. “But for now we need to get you two to Hogwarts. Quickly, now. Go get your trunks. Bring your brooms.” Harry opened his mouth; Lupin put up a hand. “Don’t argue. Just go.”

Draco looked to his mother. Narcissa said calmly, “Do as they say, darling.”

So they went. Harry pocketed Scrimgeour’s letter and the Verignis. They took the steps two at a time.

“_Pack_,” Draco cast, the instant they reached their room. They exchanged a look as the trunks filled and closed. Harry’s fear was in Draco’s eyes.

As the trunk lids snapped shut, Harry called for Kreacher.

“Master?” Kreacher bowed.

“Please take our trunks downstairs,” Harry said. “And also, there’ll likely be an Order meeting soon in the guest room. If you can, I’d like you to listen in on what they say and report to me in Hogwarts. Can you do that?”

“Master must not wonder if Kreacher _can_,” Kreacher said. “Master need only ask, and Kreacher will.” He disappeared with a pop. So did the trunks.

“Good thinking,” remarked Draco. As one, they went back downstairs, Summoning their broomsticks from the courtyard.

They were Side-Alonged to Hogsmeade, and then obliged to get on their brooms and fly to Hogwarts. Nothing happened on the journey there, but Lupin and Tonks moved with such urgency that neither Draco nor Harry questioned their direction any further.

Professor McGonagall met them at the gates. “Thank you Remus, Nymphadora,” she said briskly. “I’ll take it from here.”

“Professor,” Harry said, as Lupin and Tonks leapt back into the air, presumably to return back to headquarters, “what’s going on?”

McGonagall’s expression was as austere as always, so he hardly expected an answer, but she said, as they strode up to the castle, “He Who Must Not Be Named is moving faster than our intelligence suggested. Professor Dumbledore wanted you back here for your own safety.” As they reached the Entrance Hall, she added, as if to herself, “May Godric grant us passage.”

***

Kreacher cracked into being in the middle of their empty dormitory just before noon.

“Hang on,” Draco said, before Kreacher could begin. He cast a number of spells through the room, one of which was _Muffiliato_, which they had learnt from Snape’s book.

“Kreacher did as Master asked,” Kreacher said, speaking fast. “Kreacher hid and listened and heard the guests speak of an attack at the Ministry. Some of the guests were injured. There was argument. Lots, yes lots. Oh, what would my poor mistress have said to see such terrible manners? Dumbledore brought the guests to order. Dumbledore said that they had to ‘assess the situation.’”

“An attack?” said Harry.

“Yes,” replied Kreacher. “Kreacher heard them speak of an explosion in the Department of Mysteries. One of them said that the Ministry has been destroyed. The other said that was nonsense. Someone else said that the Dark Lord means to become the Minister for Magic himself. Another said that was too straightforward.”

“What’s happened to the Minister for Magic?” asked Harry. “Scrimgeour? Did they mention him?”

“They said he was missing. Someone said he might be dead.”

“What motivated the attack?” Draco inquired intently, “Was the Dark Lord after something?”

“Kreacher does not know. The guests spent much of their time arguing about this, but no conclusion was reached.” Kreacher bent over, appearing to think. “One guest said that it was suspicious that they had no idea this attack was coming, and there was another argument, but then Dumbledore cast a spell, and there was silence. After that, Dumbledore assigned some of them to go to the Ministry, and the meeting ended.”

“What about my mother? Did Dumbledore assign her a task?”

“Mistress Cissy did not speak, only observed, and she was not one of those Dumbledore sent to the Ministry.”

“I see,” Draco said.

It wasn’t as illuminating as Harry had hoped for, and Kreacher, as if sensing the disappointment, raised his head to say, “If Kreacher’s report is insufficient, Kreacher is willing to encase his ears in ice for a week to —“

“That won’t be necessary,” interrupted Harry hastily. “No, Kreacher. You did well. Thank you.” He took Kreacher’s hand, bending down to look him in the eye. “Really. Thanks. Please will you go back now to the house, and let us know if anything further happens there?”

“Kreacher will, Master Potter, and gladly,” came the reply. Kreacher pulled his hand away and disapparated.

Draco walked over to the window and thunked his head against the glass. “Either he had difficulty following the meeting, or the Order itself has very little information at present. Which do you think is more likely?”

Harry was loathe to guess, because he knew which option he wanted to be true, but as the day wore on the likelihood that Kreacher had misunderstood or misheard the meeting diminished. The _Prophet_, which had of course already released its issue for the day — with nothing untoward in its articles — printed a special breaking news edition shortly after lunchtime. Harry and Draco, who had relocated to the Astronomy Tower, watched the owls fly in.

There were only two articles. The first one, with the headline of _MINISTER BREAKS STATUTE OF SECRECY, RAISES WAND TO MUGGLES_, contained several shocking eyewitness accounts of Scrimgeour and other Ministry officials and Aurors ‘rampaging’ throughout central London and attacking Muggles. The second one, much shorter, detailed rumours of an incident at the Ministry proper, but provided no details. It sounded as though no one — at least no reporter — had been able to access the Ministry at all. Neither of the articles had photos of any use; there were only a couple of mugshots and a bland image of the atrium as it looked normally.

“That can’t be right,” Harry said, flattening the paper against the stone ledge. “If Scrimgeour was running around hexing Muggles, there’s no way the Order wouldn’t have known about it.”

“They didn’t know about it because Scrimgeour _wasn’t_ hexing anyone,” Draco said. “This entire story is false; a cover for something else.”

Not many students had stayed over at Hogwarts through the holidays, but everyone had seen the articles. On their way to the Great Hall for dinner they passed a lone Gryffindor who took one look at them and went pale, turning immediately to walk in the other direction.

“So much for bravery,” Draco commented under his breath, but without much amusement.

The Great Hall itself was nearly empty; only McGonagall and Burbage were at the High Table. The sound of cutlery clinked timidly through the frozen air, and Harry found himself talking in whispers. That night, he had trouble sleeping, and from the rhythm of Draco’s breaths, so did he.

The next day opened with a fresh issue of the _Prophet_. A follow-up article about the attacks on Muggles was still front and centre, although no new information had surfaced. There was another article underneath it: _DISAPPEARANCES AT THE MINISTRY_.

“It’s like half the Ministry is missing,” Harry said, reading it.

“More than half,” said Draco, reading over his shoulder.

The rest of the paper was filled with speculation about Voldemort, and even an edited reprint of Harry’s interview from the year before. There was an op-ed by Braithwaite urging for the community at large to calm down, and a reader-submitted piece along much the same lines. ‘I believe in Dumbledore,’ it ended.

But for the next couple of days Dumbledore was nowhere to be found, at least when it came to the public eye. France sent through a team of Obliviators to assist what remained of the British Ministry workers in handling the Muggles in central London. There were otherwise no further developments. For the first time in a long time, Harry found himself wishing for access to a television, wishing that wizardkind _had_ television and live reporting. The closest thing was the Wizarding Wireless Network, which repeated what the papers said, and was of no use. There was simply not enough information, and every minute dragged.

On the third night, Draco climbed wordlessly into Harry’s bed after an age of both of them tossing and turning. Harry supposed that the nightmare excuse still worked, considering the state of their waking hours. He let Draco’s sharp chin dig into his shoulder and Draco’s hand wind loosely into his and was immensely relieved when morning arrived through the black veil of real sleep.

Dumbledore came back on the 5th, along with the rest of the students. He stood up at the High Table at dinner to instant and absolute silence.

Still, he spent several seconds gazing at them all before speaking. “Happy new year, and welcome back. Due to the severity of abuse of Polyjuice Potion over the past few months, I have applied several new countermeasures throughout the castle with the invaluable assistance of our Potions Master, Professor Slughorn. I trust that you will all proceed with caution.” He sat back down.

Everyone started talking all at once.

“That’s _it_?” said Pansy disbelievingly.

“I don’t believe it,” said Tracey.

“Is he joking?” asked a third-year loudly.

“That’s Dumbledore for you,” said Blaise.

“Yeah,” Harry agreed.

Draco was looking up and down the Slytherin table. Abruptly, he put a hand on Harry’s arm. “Where’s Crabbe? And Goyle?”

They weren’t there. Pansy said slowly, “I thought maybe they’d stuffed themselves too much on the train and went to sleep it off.”

“They were on the train?” Draco prompted.

“I don’t know,” Pansy replied. “Mother apparated me in.”

“They weren’t,” said Daphne from further down the table. “At least, I didn’t see them.”

“Shit,” Blaise said. All of them stared at each other, wide-eyed.

“Maybe they’re just late,” Pansy offered, sounding unconvinced herself.

But Greg and Vincent’s beds were still empty come Monday, when the _Prophet_ published a retraction of their previous article to mass confusion and paranoia: apparently, the attacks on Muggles had not been made by Scrimgeour or Ministry Aurors, but by a group of unidentified wizards believed to be Death Eaters escaped from Azkaban. There was no explanation about how the mistake had been made in the first place, only an assertion that this was ‘a correction from official sources.’ Alongside the retraction came another long report about the so-called incident at the Ministry — the previous rumours of an explosion were confirmed, again with information gained from ‘official sources.’ According to this new report, the Department of Mysteries had been destroyed, but due to the nature of the work conducted there no one could say as to the extent of the damage.

“Kreacher mentioned that, about the Department of Mysteries,” Harry remarked.

“So some of this is true,” said Draco. Every few minutes he kept looking up and over to the side, as if hoping to find Greg or Vincent there.

Harry asked quietly, “Would your mother know anything?”

“She would tell me if she did,” Draco replied, but then added: “I’ll send her an owl.”

Someone cleared their throat; Harry turned. It was a Ravenclaw he didn’t know. “For you,” she said, handing over a sealed piece of parchment.

It was from Dumbledore. Harry showed Draco. “Tonight.”

***

“As you can no doubt see,” said Dumbledore, who looked more tired than Harry had ever seen him, “this memory has been tampered with.”

“You mean Professor Slughorn altered it himself?” Harry questioned. “Or that someone Obliviated him?”

“The former,” Dumbledore answered. He moved to Fawkes’ perch and stroked a finger down the phoenix’s neck. Fawkes cooed. After a while, Dumbledore continued, “I had originally planned to ask you to complete a task for me, Harry — I had hoped that you would be able to retrieve for me the original, true memory from Professor Slughorn, but I fear that with the latest developments we are running out of time for such delicate procedures.”

Harry considered this. “You couldn’t convince Professor Slughorn to give you the true memory yourself?”

“It took much trickery for me to obtain even this altered one,” confessed Dumbledore.

“But you thought I’d be able to get it?”

Eyeing him behind the half-moon glasses, Dumbledore admitted, “Perhaps I should not have.”

That wasn’t what Harry had meant — he’d been surprised to receive Dumbledore’s regard, that was all, but the misunderstanding was typical of their conversations. Harry sighed, and said, “What was Riddle asking about? What’s a Horcrux?”

He thought for sure that Dumbledore would reply obliquely, or not at all, but Dumbledore told him, “It’s a piece of a soul, broken off from its origin through murder,” and went on to explain the topic quite thoroughly, enlightening Harry about the diary from second year, and the ring which had cursed Dumbledore’s arm.

Harry felt as though he had woken up suddenly from a dream in which he had been falling: the feeling of immense disorientation was that intense. “So I’ve — we’ve already destroyed two? How many more are there?”

“That is the crux of the matter.” Dumbledore left Fawkes and returned back to his seat behind his desk. Harry sat down as well. “You see, each creation of a Horcrux destabilises the soul. There have been no records of anyone making more than one, and here we have evidence that Voldemort has succeeded at at least two.”

“You’re saying — you don’t know.”

“I don’t,” Dumbledore said, and his voice was heavy. “I have my guesses, but should I prove to be wrong, the result could be catastrophic. This is why I’d originally planned to obtain Professor Slughorn’s true memory, but alas, Voldemort has begun his assault on the Ministry, and I fear that soon — well.” He touched the blackened arm.

“Guesses,” Harry said, an edge of desperation he didn’t like in the word. “You have guesses. Will you tell me what they are?”

“I certainly will. I must, in fact. But not tonight. I must confess that I am — exhausted, Harry.” Fawkes trilled, as though to underscore the words as truth. “However, I promise you that it will be soon. Within this month. But for now, before this session ends, is there anything else you have to say? That you want to know?”

Harry was tempted to ask if the sudden offering of information was some sort of trick, but there was something he could see in Dumbledore in that moment that reminded him of a bough of an oak tree he had seen once as a child, weakened by rot and pulled down by gravity. So he said instead, “What happened at the Ministry? To Scrimgeour? What’s been going on?”

“There is not much I can tell you that your house-elf did not overhear,” Dumbledore said. Harry looked away. “Voldemort has been making attempts to infiltrate the Ministry for some time. You will have followed the news of the various disappearances, I’m sure. There was a confrontation on New Year’s Eve between Death Eaters and the Order, which escalated. The Department of Mysteries was heavily damaged. Most notably, their supply of Time Turners has been, as far as we can tell, completely destroyed.” At this, the portraits of previous headmasters and headmistresses began to whisper to each other. Dumbledore waited patiently for them to quiet. “The Order worked to secure the area afterward, which also meant keeping the media away. And as for Rufus Scrimgeour, I believe you may have more information than me.”

“I did meet with him at Christmas,” Harry admitted uncomfortably. “He seemed — I thought he was all right. I don’t think he would attack Muggles.”

“On that we are in agreement. Unfortunately, I do not know the truth of the incident. It could have been Imperius, or Polyjuice, or an illusion, or even just a made-up story. The important part that does not change is the fact that the Minister has vanished along with many others, and public faith in the Ministry as a whole is crumbling.”

Harry hesitated, then decided that he might as well. “I received an owl from Scrimgeour on the morning of the 1st, actually. It was written in a hurry. He was trying to warn me, I think.”

“Then perhaps we can hope that Rufus is on the run, and not compromised,” Dumbledore surmised.

“Also,” Harry said, “Greg and Vincent —“

“Are missing, I know,” finished Dumbledore. “They are not the only ones. Several students across all the Houses have not returned. Families are going into hiding, Harry. Some of them I suspect have already left the country.”

“But,” Harry disputed, and stopped. Switzerland, Vincent had said.

“I cannot give you the reassurance you seek, Harry. They may have left the country. They may have gone to a safehouse under Fidelius. Or they may have joined the enemy.”

Hearing Dumbledore say it felt like a death sentence. Harry shut his eyes, but there was nowhere to escape to. “All right,” he said finally. “Thank you for being honest with me, sir.”

***

Members of the Order of the Phoenix began to step forward throughout January, and, with assistance from what remained of the Ministry, bring stability back to wizarding Britain. The Order itself was still guarding its secrecy, but the shift in leadership of the country was indisputable. Dumbledore was frequently absent from Hogwarts, instead making appearances at Whitehall, St Mungo’s and Diagon Alley, and wherever he went the media followed. He was a beacon of hope, the bastion of power that held peace together.

And he was going to die. Not in the distant future. But soon.

Harry tried not to think about it. Sometimes he didn’t think about it so hard that he could not concentrate on anything else.

“Hey, Harry,” Pansy said, snapping her fingers in front of his face.

He started. “Sorry, Pans. What’d you say?”

“Nothing,” Pansy told him. “Only: eat. I won’t have you wasting away. You’re as bad as Draco; the both of you just sit there, staring into space. You’re setting a bad example for my first-years. Little Rosier’s completely lost her appetite. I’m not your mother, you know.” Her expression softened. “I mean —“

“I know what you mean,” Harry said, trying for a smile. “Thanks.”

Narcissa had had no information to divulge on the whereabouts of Greg or Vincent. And Dumbledore had been right: there were other missing students. It wasn’t obvious at first unless you knew what you were looking at. Gaps in the seating at the House tables were natural, after all; people tended to shift closer to their friends, and anyway everyone came and went and ate at their own pace. But after a while Harry began to notice patterns. The gaps were too wide, and some students were now always alone. Gryffindor seemed to have the least number missing, but they, too, had lost numbers: he confirmed it when he went to speak with Ron and Hermione, and they informed him that one of Ginny’s friends had gone.

Mindful of being overheard, Harry took Draco out to the still frozen lakeside under _Muffiliato_ to tell him about the Horcruxes.

“Okay,” said Draco without inflection after he finished. Harry waited. Draco bent down and scooped up a handful of snow, lobbing it messily at the lake. “Two of them have been destroyed. We’ll get the others.”

“We don’t know how many there are,” Harry repeated uselessly.

“We’ll get them,” Draco said.

It wasn’t that Draco was an unrelenting optimist. It was only — he wasn’t saying the other half of the sentence, which was that they would get them, or perish in the attempt.

True to his word, Dumbledore revealed the last of his collection of Pensieve memories pertaining to the Horcruxes before January ended. He called Harry to his office late on a Friday night, and as soon as Harry entered he knew that both of them were weary to the bone.

They viewed the memories and discussed Tom Riddle.

“So,” Harry concluded. “The cup, and the locket?”

“If my suspicions are correct,” said Dumbledore. “There is also, I believe, his snake, Nagini.” He paused, putting his good hand on his beard pensively. “On that I may be mistaken, as it is inadvisable to turn another living thing into a Horcrux, but …” And he expanded on his thoughts on the Slytherin symbolism and Voldemort’s attachment to the snake.

“That makes five,” said Harry. “Surely that’s enough?”

“Perhaps. Or perhaps not. You’ll note that Tom went after trophies from the Founders — well, there is still Gryffindor and Ravenclaw to account for.” Dumbledore grew the ghost of a smile and gestured across the room; Harry turned to see a sword, hanging from the wall. It had not always been there. “The Sword of Gryffindor,” Dumbledore explained. “I’m quite confident that this is the only known relic of Godric in existence.”

“All right.” The sword gleamed. It looked as sharp as must have done the day it had been forged. “Then something of Ravenclaw’s?”

“Maybe.” Dumbledore sighed. “Seven is a powerful, magical number; I must admit that I have long suspected, ever since the prospect of _more than one_ was introduced, that Tom would be drawn to it. If so, then we have it: six Horcruxes, and Voldemort himself. But he is unstable. He could have made more.” And here Dumbledore opened his mouth again as though to impart something else, but visibly stopped himself. Harry frowned, but in the next moment Dumbledore continued, “There you have it. I’ve endeavoured to be direct, Harry. I suspect you have not enjoyed learning these revelations.”

“No,” Harry said faintly.

They stared at each other across the expanse of the desk. Eventually, Dumbledore prompted softly, “It is quite late. You should make your way to bed.”


	20. Chapter 20

The Ministry worker scheduled for their apparition lessons was one of those missing. The Heads of Houses ran the class themselves instead, Flitwick taking the lead. He amplified his voice with _Sonorus_ and loudly but still squeakily lectured them on Destination, Determination and Destitution, or whatever it was —

“Potter,” hissed Draco. “Pay attention.”

“I am,” Harry lied. “Pay attention yourse—“ To their left, he caught sight of Snape glaring at them, making as if to move over, no doubt to threaten detention because Harry was guilty of breathing. He cleared his throat and hurriedly put more distance between himself and Draco.

Nothing happened that first lesson, unless you counted Blaise performing a dramatic and decidedly unmagical twirl and physically leaping into his hoop, thereby securing for himself the unenviable fate of being the butt of every joke in the Slytherin common room for the next week or more. At least, Harry thought, it brought some laughter back into the landscape.

They were in sore need of laughter. News trickled in throughout February of Dementor attacks; it seemed that Voldemort was allowing them to run wild through wizarding and Muggle territory alike. The _Prophet_ reporting in this regard was somewhat muted, full of conservative statements like ‘Muggle trains suffer delays,’ or ‘Kissed Muggle mistakenly admitted to St Mungo’s.’

“It’s mass hysteria,” announced Hermione bluntly, when Harry went down with them to visit Hagrid. “I sent my parents to Paris, and — Mum managed to get an owl to me through the liaison there and she says it’s — oh Harry. No one knows what’s happening; they wake up and the sky is dark like it’s still night; it’s all over the news, multiple dead bodies from suicides in the Thames and they can’t explain it, not properly. The weather isn’t getting any warmer at all for them, and lights and heaters just fail inexplicably. A man goes to his car and finds that it’s become a block of ice, somehow. And then the French Obliviators get in there and it’s still all happening but now there’s missing memories. God. I keep thinking …” she trailed off, pressing the back of her hand to her mouth as though to push whatever it was she had been about to impart back down.

Ron put his arm tentatively around her shoulders. “It’s — hey, ‘Mione, hey. Your parents are safe.”

“The Order’s out there,” said Hagrid, throwing a bone to Fang. “Dumbledore’s got ‘em on patrol.”

“Yeah,” Ron said. “Bill wrote me. Says he and Charlie and Fred and George have been out with their Patronuses in shifts. The Muggles probably think they’re ghosts, or spirits.”

Harry stared at his tea, despondent. “I could do that.”

“Don’ be silly,” Hagrid said. “Yer not o’ age.”

“It’s only a few months difference,” Harry argued.

“It’s not just a matter of age and time,” said Hermione solemnly. If anything, she sounded like she was trying to convince herself. “We should at least know how to apparate, for instance.”

“Then we’ll just have to learn quickly,” Harry said.

Hermione raised her chin up; the movement was almost defiant. “That’s what I mean to do.”

Pressed down ever more with the weight of everything they could stand to lose, Harry shut away his endless thoughts on the Horcruxes and focused, managing to Splinch himself in the third lesson. He’d thought that it was a successful apparition at first, but he had left behind a fingernail; Snape reattached it with a judgemental sneer. After that, it was easier. He did it again without losing any body parts at all, though he overshot the hoop by several metres. By the fourth lesson, he was accurate four times out of five, and he wasn’t the only one making significant progress. It was like a cold fever had seized them all. “The Dementors are coming,” he overheard Ernie Macmillian whisper to Susan Bones. Harry knew that Finch-Fletchley, their Muggleborn friend, had left Hogwarts the week before.

“Help me with my Patronus,” said Draco that same day.

They went to the Room of Requirement and practised. But no matter how many times Draco cast, whether he did it with force or without, no matter which memory he tried, he could not manage more than a shield of light.

“Maybe,” he said quietly, laying down directly on the floor, beads of sweat on his forehead, “I should just work on maintaining what I have, forget about the corporeal form —“

“No,” Harry denied sharply. “There’s nothing wrong with your wandwork, or your level of magic. It’s just —“ he thought quickly — “Lupin said that sometimes the corporeal form can appear when you’re confronted with a real Dementor, you know, when there’s a sort of — snap decision.”

Draco processed this. “You mean that I’m overthinking it.”

“You and I both know you can be too analytical.”

Draco gave a half-smile. He seemed too tired to retort, and only said, “All right, Harry.”

Harry pulled him up. “Let’s — what was that?”

As one they turned to the door.

“Someone’s outside,” Draco whispered. They could hear the sound of pacing: back and forth, back and forth. Then whoever it was stopped to tap on where the door would have been, not as if they were knocking, but rather as if they were searching for a hollow space behind the wall. “They want the Room.”

“I asked the Room for privacy,” Harry whispered back. “They can’t get in.”

“Could be one of ours,” said Draco.

“Shall I open the door and see?”

“No,” Draco answered without pause. “I want to practise some more. They can go find an empty classroom.”

***

Harry, Draco, Pansy and Theo were studying together in the common room late on the last night of February when the stone scraped open to reveal Snape. It was well past midnight, and the room was quite empty; still, you could feel immediately the sudden shift in alertness.

“Mr Malfoy,” said Snape, voice low.

Draco closed his Transfiguration textbook and stood up. “Yes, sir?”

“Follow,” Snape said, and swept back out without further explanation.

They looked at each other. Harry put down his quill. “I’m coming, too.”

“Maybe he has information on Greg and Vincent,” Pansy said hopefully.

All the blood had drained out of Theo’s face. He said, “Draco,” then stopped and shook his head.

“What?” Draco said. “What is it?”

But Theo only shook his head again, violently.

“C’mon,” Harry said, pulling on Draco’s arm. “We’d better hurry.”

They had to run to catch up to Snape, who sped up even more when he saw them, expression shifting slightly when he noted Harry’s presence.

“Sir,” Draco said, as they waited for a staircase to turn back, “is it —“ his voice shook — “what’s happened, sir?”

“Your mother was injured,” Snape replied; then, as Draco’s head whipped towards him, he added, “She is here now, safe.”

Narcissa had been laid down on one of the hospital wing beds along the far wall, privacy curtains partially drawn. Professor McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey were stepping away as they arrived; Pomfrey was carrying an empty vial. She put a finger to her lips. “Quietly, now. She’s just gone to sleep. It’s crucial that she is allowed to rest.”

“Mr Potter,” McGonagall said, raising an eyebrow, “should you be here?”

Snape’s mouth formed a humourless shape that could not quite be called a smile. “Potter has a tendency to be where he should not.” Still, he did not tell Harry to leave.

Treading lightly, Harry followed Draco to Narcissa’s bedside. Her hair was undone and her face loose with sleep; she hardly looked like herself, but she was breathing steadily, and there were no visible signs of damage.

“Lung Flaying Curse,” Pomfrey was saying to Snape. “How she managed to travel with that … well, she’ll be all right. It’s a good thing she came here, I don’t know if they would have been able to treat her in time at St Mungo’s — they’ve been swarmed.”

“You’re the one who found her at the gates, Severus?” asked McGonagall.

“Yes. She wanted to see Draco.”

McGonagall turned back to them, but spoke to Snape. “She didn’t say anything else?”

“She could barely speak,” Snape replied. Draco trembled. Harry stepped closer until their shoulders were aligned. Snape glanced at them and began to lead McGonagall and Pomfrey away.

Pomfrey said, “Where is the Headmaster?”

“He’ll be back tomorrow morning,” said Snape.

“Then we’ll …” said McGonagall, but they had moved too far away for Harry to hear the rest.

He pulled the curtains all the way closed, then conjured two chairs — wooden, not the most comfortable, but serviceable — and tugged Draco into one. Draco reached out and took one of Narcissa’s hands. Her skin was so drained of colour it was almost translucent; the veins stood out starkly underneath, green and blue tinged with purple.

They didn’t say anything. As the hours wore on Harry conjured blankets, too, and wrapped it around them both with a Warming Charm on top, but Draco barely moved. He just stared at his mother’s face, always breathing after she breathed first. Harry pulled his legs up, closing his eyes.

He fell asleep around the same time the rose gold of sunrise began push through the curtains and paint the tip of Narcissa’s fingers pink with life. He dreamed of someone humming a song, a woman, and the song was a lullaby, soothing like he was drifting on the ocean, but the melody was as difficult to hold onto as a palmful of sand in a strong wind, and then there was a noise that did not belong in the dream, and he was jerking awake; the song vanished.

“Darling,” said Narcissa’s voice. “What day is it?”

Harry stretched and kneaded his neck. Narcissa was awake and Draco was helping her sit up, fussing over her pillows, handing her a glass of water. “You arrived at Hogwarts last night, Mother.”

“Good,” Narcissa said, voice growing stronger. “Sit, Draco, and be calm.” She took a long drink. “The Dark Lord is using the Manor. He’s subdued the wards and taken over the grounds.” She put the glass away and enveloped Draco’s hand in both of hers. “You know that your father —“ she flicked her eyes at Harry.

“Harry stays,” Draco said firmly.

“All right,” Narcissa allowed. “Your father during those last few months was under Imperius intermittently, but that was not all. The Dark Lord was — be calm, darling — feeding him to the Dementors, to lower his defenses.” Draco made a violent motion at the words, but Narcissa’s hand on his held him firm. “Bella told this to me, and Bella does not lie when she speaks gleefully of bleak things.”

“Was _she_ the one who…?” Draco asked.

“No. She still thinks I can be convinced. I’ve been meeting her for months, sharing false stories for the few grains of truth.” Narcissa smiled a shark’s smile. “No, this was from a new ward in the Manor. You were right about Polyjuice, darling. There was an opportunity to acquire Bella’s hair, so I took it. She’d been hinting at the Manor, over and over, but each time I approached it as myself it was in ruins, hostile but weak. So I thought to disguise myself, and see if there was anything else to find. I was successful in deceiving Nott; he lead me to a hidden entrance, carved through my rose garden like a wound, but I was careless in my search for anything Lucius might have left behind for us: the Dark Lord has already planted deeper roots than I’d anticipated. I’m afraid the same trick won’t work again.”

“Mother,” Draco said, a world of emotion in one word.

“I know, Draco.” Narcissa touched his cheek. “I’m here.”

There was the sound of footsteps, and murmuring. Harry parted the curtains slightly. “It’s Dumbledore, and some other members of the Order.”

Draco hesitated. Narcissa caught it and said reassuringly, “Go.” She drew out her wand and whispered a charm over Draco, the one that banished the shadows under his eyes. “We will speak more later.”

***

They had missed breakfast and the apparition lesson, but it was around lunctime, if a little late, so they went down to the Great Hall. Before they could go in, however, Hermione appeared from further down the corridor, half-running. “Harry!” she called, and seemed to stop herself just barely from throwing her arms around him; instead, she grabbed onto his shoulder. “Harry, thank god, I thought you’d gone, too.”

Harry shared a disconcerted look with Draco. He said, “Hermione, it’s not like I’d just _leave_,” but Hermione was shaking her head, reaching into her school bag. “What’s wrong?”

“A bunch of parents came and took their kids this morning,” she explained, knuckles white as she held out a copy of the _Daily Prophet_.

The headline read, _MINISTRY DEPARTMENT HEADS MURDERED, BODIES DISPLAYED IN ATRIUM_. Underneath was an extremely blurry photo of vaguely human shapes rotating slowly in midair. Harry squinted at it, then saw the small line of text printed below: _Due to the shocking nature of this content, an Age Restricted Viewing Charm has been placed across this photograph._

Hermione, already seventeen, had her gaze locked on the photo, mouth twisted as though she was going to be sick. She said, “I can cast the counter-charm, but I’m not sure if you want to see it.”

“Merlin’s sake,” Draco muttered, and got out his wand. “_Ertavisum_.”

Harry sort of wished that he hadn’t. The bodies were naked, and looked like they had been decomposing for some time; to make it worse, whoever had orchestrated the display had beheaded each of the corpses and then switched the heads around, as though to make a joke. He gulped, and felt rather glad that he hadn’t yet had a chance to eat.

Draco read the article: “‘Wizards and witches volunteering to repair and rebuild the Ministry encountered a gruesome spectacle as they entered the atrium … believed to have been dead since early January … likely placed during the night … what is thought to be the left hand of Minister Rufus Scrimgeour was also discovered at the scene.’”

“Fuck,” Harry hissed.

“Wait,” Draco said. “It says the hand is ‘fresh.’ Scrimgeour might still be alive.”

“You said that parents came and took their children?” Harry said to Hermione.

“That’s right,” she confirmed. “Right after breakfast, after this article came out — they came right to the gates from Hogsmeade. Professor Dumbledore wasn’t there, and — and Professor McGonagall couldn’t stop them.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “Some of the others — you know that Muggleborn parents can’t get to the school so easily, and they might not even know this has happened. I’ve been trying to help some of the younger kids get in touch with their parents, but it’s — oh Harry, usually they send owls and it goes through a proxy to the Royal Mail, but there isn’t enough time. If only we had a telephone. It’s such a mess.”

“They can’t send owls to their parents directly?” Harry asked.

“Owls have difficulty tracing recipients with no magical core,” Draco said.

Glancing at Draco warily, Hermione elaborated, “Some Muggleborn’s parents might actually be Squibs, so it could work in that case, but it’s not a sure solution.”

“I know that,” Harry said impatiently. “What I mean is, can’t they send the owls to their home addresses, instead of to a person? Owls can still be taught to remember specific locations, even if the locations aren’t magical, right?” Then he realised the implications. “Oh.”

“It’d be like painting a target over a house for the Death Eaters,” Hermione said miserably. “I mean, normally, they go through the proxy because Muggles might not want their neighbours wondering at the owls, but now …” She took a deep breath. “I caught two first-year Gryffindors trying to sneak out on their own with stolen school brooms. I didn’t know what to tell them, Harry. One of them hasn’t had a letter from her mum and dad in two weeks. She said she thinks they might be _dead_ —“

“Calm down, Granger,” Draco interjected coolly.

Hermione glared balefully at him. “How nice it must be for you to not care.”

“Dumbledore’s back,” Draco told her, nostrils flaring. “_He_ should have a solution, if he’s really the Muggle-loving fool all of you Gryffindors think he is.”

“Right,” Harry said hastily, getting in between them. “He’ll be able to do something.”

To his surprise, Hermione did not look particularly bolstered. She frowned and took back her copy of the _Prophet_, folding it so that the photo was hidden. “I tried speaking to Professor McGonagall already, but there are so many things going on, the professors … No, I do need to do better.” She turned to stare at the doors to the Great Hall with immense preoccupation. “I think I’ll …” and abruptly she gripped Harry’s upper arm, saying, “Thanks, Harry,” even though Harry hadn’t done anything, and marched off purposefully.

“I bet you one thousand galleons,” Draco murmured as they watched her leave, “that Granger will be Minister for Magic one day, if we don’t all die horribly first.”

“Wow,” Harry said, raising his brows, “you actually really do think highly of her.”

Scowling, Draco responded, “I meant it in an insulting way, Potter. I just want you to owe me one thousand galleons and have it be Granger’s fault.” Harry snorted. Draco shoved at him; Harry shoved back.

***

Dumbledore addressed the school at dinner, and, unlike in January, this time he spoke candidly. As they listened, all the candles of the Great Hall flared steadily brighter, and for a few moments Dumbledore’s magic was so overwhelming it was practically transcendent, but then it passed and Harry could see again the blackened, withered arm, the fatigue that was obvious in the split second pause between sentences, all the signs that the Horcrux’s curse was eroding the cliffs of Dumbledore’s endurance.

It wasn’t completely lost on the rest of the students either. There were many more empty spots now, and the sense of despair each absence brought was like a miasma underfoot, pulling them down, down, down. They drank in Dumbledore’s words of resilience and hope like parched saplings, and when he sat down again turned their faces to their plates, uncertain once more.

Pansy spent the entire dinner with her head on Draco’s shoulder, fighting back tears. On her other side, Blaise held her hand. Tracey and Theo had both gone. Tracey, whose family had been steadfastly neutral during the first war, must have fled for safety. But Theo — Harry suspected that Theo’s circumstances were … different.

He wasn’t wrong. That night, as he settled down to attempt sleep, he found a folded note underneath his pillow. Reaching for his glasses, he cast a wandless _Lumos_ and recognised Theo’s neat script:

_watch the room_

“He must mean the Room of Requirement,” Draco surmised the next day. “There _was_ someone who was trying to get in …”

Those were Harry’s thoughts, too, but he was at a loss on how they could both watch the Room and manage to attend their classes, and was actually considering skipping until he remembered Kreacher.

“Not all the time,” Harry said. “You need to sleep as well.”

“Kreacher requires only an hour,” said Kreacher resolutely.

“Er,” Harry said. “I’m pretty sure that you’d do better with more. Look — is there maybe some sort of house-elf magic you could use to set up an alarm or something if someone approaches?”

“Kreacher is not an elf of this abode,” Kreacher said, with a tilt of his head that suggested amusement. It wasn’t an emotion Harry had ever seen him exhibit before. “So Kreacher cannot impose in that way. But Kreacher will speak with the elves who belong here, if Master wishes.”

“If you think they will help,” Harry replied. “Please do.”

Despite the circumstances, he still felt kind of ridiculous ordering possibly a rotation of house elves to monitor a room that did not even exist most of the time, and ended up making many detours in between lessons himself to check that nothing untoward was happening. Each time, the seventh floor corridor was empty.

It took one week for Madam Pomfrey to declare Narcissa well enough to leave the hospital wing. During that time Draco visited her daily, one hour each evening. On the day of her discharge he dawdled in the common room, as though reluctant to go alone, so Harry said, “I was just fancying a walk,” and went with him.

Narcissa seemed unsurprised that Draco had brought company. Still, Harry stood to the side and stared out the window as they spoke quietly about things like Draco’s marks, his progress with nonverbal spells, his Alchemy project — normal things, a mask over the real conversation. The parting itself was very brief; Narcissa kissed Draco lightly on his cheek and said to him only: “You will not dwell upon any pyre, darling.”

“It means she will be safe,” Draco told Harry later, when Harry brought it up. “It’s an old pureblood saying, from the time of witch burnings.”

More students trickled out of Hogwarts. The daily news had reached a sort of deadened equilibrium, where a chaotic reality was the status quo. Harry opened the paper each morning as though he were stepping in front of a firing line, bracing for the worst, but it was all the same continuous bombardment of misery with no new developments, until one day he was greeted with: _HOGWARTS ONE HUNDRED PLEDGE TO FIGHT, DEFEND STRONGHOLD_.

There was a recent photo of the castle in the cusp of spring, new life and new growth, beautiful and idyllic. He found Hermione quoted in the article almost immediately, and of course this was her doing.

_‘Hogwarts has stood for over a thousand years,’_ she said. _‘All if you know it better than I. We will not run.’_

It was a bold boast, made in exactly the same way a lion might have roared at the sky.

“She’s made herself a target,” Harry said, conflicted.

“Will you tell her to stop?” Draco asked rhetorically. “The power of reckless courage lies in its contagious nature. That’s practically the foundation of Gryffindor. Maybe this is necessary.”

Maybe it was, but it still bothered him, so ceaselessly that he at last found himself standing at the gargoyle, going through every sweet he could think of until it let him in.

As the spiralling stairs carried him upward, he began to hear voices.

“… respect, Albus, Mundungus was never reliable,” came McGonagall’s voice.

“He would not betray me,” came Dumbledore’s reply.

“Be as that may,” said Snape’s low oiled drawl, “he is two days dead in a Muggle alley, nothing in his possession, not even a wand.”

“Stab wounds,” McGonagall said. “_Stab_ wounds, Albus, from a common knife.”

“It seems improbable to me,” added Snape, “that he was performing his duties at the time, if he was so inebriated that he allowed himself to be assaulted by Muggles.” Then: “It seems Potter is at the door.”

Harry jumped guiltily. The door swung open.

“Hello, Harry,” said Dumbledore.

“Er, hi,” Harry said. “Sorry, I meant to knock — I didn’t mean to eavesdrop.”

“And yet you failed at the former and succeeded at the latter,” Snape said. “Fascinating.”

“Severus, honestly, he’s in your own House,” McGonagall scolded, though the look she directed at Harry was vaguely disapproving nevertheless.

“It’s no matter,” Dumbledore said to them. “I had, in fact, been hoping to speak with Harry myself. Thank you both for your thoughts on Mundungus, Minerva, Severus. We will continue this later.”

Harry shuffled aside to let McGonagall and Snape pass. Snape stared at him in the eye as he went. Harry put up his Occlumency barriers hurriedly.

“Not fast enough, Potter,” Snape said, and swept out before Harry could retort.

“Now, Harry,” said Dumbledore once the door had closed. “What troubles drove you up to my office?”

But Harry, prickly from interacting with Snape, asked, “Mundungus? Was he a member of the Order?” The name was familiar.

“Yes,” Dumbledore replied equably. “I don’t believe the two of you ever came into direct contact. Mundungus knew of you, of course. He was one of those I sent to guard you during the summer after your fourth year.”

Harry frowned, thinking back. “So … where was he when I was being attacked by Dementors?”

Dumbledore bowed his head, conceding the point. “Minerva is correct in saying that he was not always reliable. After that summer, I put him toward other tasks.” Sighing, Dumbledore tapped one of his silver instruments with his wand, and as it rang with short crystalline peals, looked to be lost in thought. Eventually, he said, “Mundungus was one of the first to join the original Order of the Phoenix. He had questionable proclivities, but he would not have betrayed me willingly.”

“Questionable proclivities?” Harry echoed.

“He had quick hands,” Dumbledore replied. “In a word, Harry, he was a thief.” Harry stared. “Is that so shocking?”

“No,” Harry said gradually. “I suppose not.”

“Mundungus had a younger brother,” Dumbledore said quietly. “As gentle as a sunshower. His name was Donan, and he was a Squib. Mundungus always believed that Donan’s powers would manifest; there wasn’t a year he was at Hogwarts when he did not write some letter of appeal to Headmaster Dippet, and then later myself, when I became Headmaster, to reconsider his brother’s enrolment.” Again there was a pause. “Mundungus was not particularly brave, or honest, or kindhearted, but he understood devotion.”

“Do you mean to say that he had good reason to be a thief? Did he steal things for the sake of his brother?”

“No, not at all. His inclination towards thievery had no noble origin.”

“Oh.” Realising he was still standing, Harry strode forward and sat down.

“After the first war, Donan convinced Mundungus that he was content to live as a Muggle. A few years later, he was killed in a traffic accident. If he had not been a Squib, if Mundungus had been there, if, if, if — he might have lived.” There was a faraway quality to Dumbledore’s voice, as though he were thinking of something else. He said, very, very softly, “Gellert always maintained that it was a waste of time to entertain _ifs_.”

Feeling as though he were walking down an unfamiliar set of stairs in the absolute dark, Harry prompted, “Gellert?”

“Gellert. When I met him he was a budding revolutionary, full of the energy of an explosion; when he was interested in something he honed upon it so intensely it burnt, and when he disdained something he could toss it in the gutter and forget about it while it was still screaming. He was obsessed with the Hallows. The Deathly Hallows — have you ever heard of them, Harry?” Harry shook his head. “They’re three legendary items, which will, it is said, grant one mastery over Death, should one possess all three. How Gellert and I coveted them.” This time, Dumbledore touched the silver instrument with just his finger, wandless, and once more the strange melancholic peals sounded. He talked through them, as though he could not bear to say his next words in silence: “I was infatuated with him. I believed that together, we could save the world. I was wrong.” The peals stopped. “Years later, Gellert amassed an army that was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands, Muggles and wizardkind alike.”

God. Dumbledore was talking about Gellert _Grindelwald_. Harry swallowed. “You — you fought him in a duel,” he said uselessly. That part, he knew.

“I didn’t want to,” said Dumbledore, bitterness in the confession.

Minutes ticked by. “So,” Harry posited tentatively, “when you told me about — about knowing a person. Were you talking about — Gellert?”

Dumbledore looked at him for a long moment before answering. “No. I think, rather, I was always talking about myself.” At Harry’s frown of confusion, he went on, “Do you know what you will do before you do it?”

What kind of question was that? “I’m not sure I understand.”

“Our actions determine who we are,” Dumbledore said, “and who we are is ever changing. The core of a person is not necessarily immutable. I didn’t want to confront Gellert. For a long time, I didn’t. But in the end, I did. And although Gellert may have been correct in saying that we should not entertain the ifs and the could-have-beens, there was a point in time when I was both the person who could stop Gellert’s rampage, and the person who could stand back and allow it.”

“But you _did_ stop him.”

“Exactly. I stopped him. But the dice rolls again and again, Harry. Each time it has the potential to land on a different face.”

“You’re saying,” Harry said, trying to follow, “that doing one good thing once does not make you a good person. That to be a good person, you have to make the right decision over and over again.”

“I’m saying that there is no guarantee,” Dumbledore corrected. “Irrespective of good or evil, right or wrong, we can only roll the dice.”

“You make it sound as though we don’t have control over our own actions.”

“Oh, we do. We can choose to do this, or that, or choose to delay and do nothing. But whatever the choice, the consequence may remain beyond our control. Another way to phrase the question would be: do you always know exactly what you have done after you did it?” Dumbledore steepled his fingers, and the half-moon glasses flashed. He said, “Harry, could you imagine yourself as a hero?”

“What?” Harry said, taken aback. “No, I —“

“You came to visit me today because you have been reading the news and you are restless. Is that not it? You want to be _doing_, to be taking action.”

“That’s right.” Harry straightened, put his palm flat on the table. “There’s got to be something I can do — I hate — I can’t stand this waiting.”

Dumbledore’s expression softened. “There will be much for you to do quite soon. But for a little while longer, please allow me to do my duty.” Fleetingly, the old twinkle in his eyes returned. “Sometimes, waiting is a luxury. Use this time well, Harry.”

***

A month and a half later, Dumbledore died.


	21. Chapter 21

Absurdly, all Quidditch matches were expected to proceed as normal despite all Houses apart from Gryffindor missing players. Harry was forced to field reserves for Beaters, two skinny second-years who were only just learning how to hold the bats, but despite that Slytherin won their match against Hufflepuff in early May, which was more of a testament to the terrible state of the Hufflepuff team than any real spectacular performance from Slytherin. The low spirits of the audience didn’t improve matters, and all in all when Harry caught the Snitch it was with a huge sense of relief.

“That’s the Cup in the bag, then,” he said to his team as they trudged back to get changed. “Unless Gryffindor manages to pull off some sort of crazy lead against Ravenclaw.”

“Like they would,” sneered Urquhart. Vaisey laughed.

“They might,” said Selwyn-Hester. “They’ve got their full team. Ravenclaw had to replace three players.”

“Chang’s a better Seeker than Weasley,” Urquhart argued. “Weasley’s too easily sidetracked by the rest of the game.”

Daphne was a bit quiet, but when he caught up with her she only slapped him amiably on the back and told him he had a bit of grass stuck to his face.

He scrubbed at his cheek. “Gone?”

“All good,” she said, then looked at something over his shoulder. She pointed, “Is that…?”

Harry turned, squinting against the sun. Hidden partially beneath the stands, in the shadows, was Kreacher.

“What’s a house-elf doing here?” wondered Daphne.

“Oh,” Harry said. “Er. It’s — never mind, don’t worry. Listen, go on ahead, I’ll catch up.”

Daphne gave him a puzzled look, but didn’t press the issue. Harry waved at her and jogged toward Kreacher.

“Master must hurry,” said Kreacher, as soon as Harry was within earshot. “There is someone in the Room right now.”

“Shit,” Harry said. “Were they already there during the match? Okay — let’s go.”

“Kreacher can bring Master there.” Kreacher put his hand on Harry’s elbow, and with a _crack_ they were in the seventh floor corridor. Someone had indeed summoned the Room; there was a plain wooden door that looked like it might’ve belonged to a broom cupboard. Without ado Harry marched towards it and twisted the handle, opening it to find —

“Hermione?!” he exclaimed, blinking.

It looked like a library had had a lovechild with a greenhouse. Hermione was there in the middle of it, along with Padma Patil and — Harry instinctively checked the location of his wand — the Weasley twins, who had definitely already graduated.

“Harry!” Hermione said, sounding surprised but not entirely unwelcoming. She took in his Quidditch attire and added, “Is something wrong?”

“Well, no, not — not exactly,” Harry told her, unbalanced. “Er. What’s with all the sunflowers?”

“Oh,” Hermione said, “I think that was the Room trying to cheer me up.”

“What’s _he_ doing here?” asked one of the twins.

“Perhaps Hermione invited him,” suggested Padma.

“I don’t believe I did,” said Hermione.

“Then you can beat it,” said the other twin to Harry.

“Will Master be needing further assistance?” chimed in Kreacher from just outside the door.

“Wait,” Harry said to the room at large, then turned around to face Kreacher. “No one else came to this Room?”

“Apart from Master Harry and Master Draco, no,” Kreacher said. “Not since Kreacher has begun his vigil.”

“I hope you’ve been sleeping,” Harry said, trying to sound strict. “Thank you, though. I’ll call on you again if I need anything.”

Kreacher bowed, and vanished.

“Well, well, well,” said a Weasley twin. “Looks like this one’s been doing a bit of stalking. Typical of a snake.”

“I haven’t been stalking anyone!” Harry told him hotly. “What are _you_ doing here? The two of you aren’t even students here anymore.”

“What’s going on, Harry?” Hermione cut in, before things could escalate.

Eyeing the twins warily, Harry told her about the time someone had tried to use the Room when he and Draco had been in it, but did not mention Theo’s note. He didn’t feel like getting hexed by Fred or George for associating with the sons of living Death Eaters, just now.

Hermione nodded thoughtfully. “There _was_ one time when I couldn’t access the Room, actually. I guess that must’ve been it? The date matches.”

“I guess, yeah,” Harry agreed, after a beat. “What’re you doing here, anyway? Is this to do with the owl-orders?”

“We’re putting those on hold,” replied Hermione. “Actually, we’re discussing plans to use Hogwarts as a stronghold.”

Harry recalled that that was the term which the _Prophet_ had used. “You mean to open it to people other than staff and students.”

“That’s right,” Hermione confirmed. “Wizarding Britain has some areas of concentration — like Diagon Alley, for instance — but on the whole it’s too scattered. Hogwarts can house far more numbers than it does currently. _Hogwarts: A History_ only speculates on its upper limits for space dilation, but even if we have to squeeze I think there would be merit in bringing people together. And anyway, we have facilities that aren’t being fully put to use, whereas St Mungo’s is completely overwhelmed.” Harry stepped further inward and saw that she had a large piece of parchment spread on a round table: it was a map of the entire castle, parts of it expanding and contracting, tiny names of every occupant within it moving around apparently in real time. The Marauder’s Map. It was the first time Harry had laid eyes on it.

Hermione continued, “Fred and George have been on the ground outside _and_ know all the ins and outs of Hogwarts well, so it’s useful to have their input. I want to draw up a workable proposal and submit it to Professor Dumbledore and the Board of Governors. If everyone agrees, we can bring in Muggleborn families as well, as long as they’re willing. This way, at least, they can all be protected together.”

“Wow, Hermione,” Harry said sincerely. “That sounds amazing.”

She grinned, pleased and suddenly shy with it, but added, voice firm, “You-Know-Who would like nothing more than to drive us apart and hunt us down individually. We can’t play into his hand.”

“No,” Harry agreed.

“I’m nearly done with it,” she said. “So actually, you barged in on us at a really good time. I’ve spoken with representatives from all the Houses except for Slytherin. If you can sign the proposal on Slytherin’s behalf, we can present a united front.” From another table she produced several pieces of parchment. “As the representative your duties won’t necessarily be onerous, but you’ll have to liaise with your House as we shift to different phases of the plan. We’ll want to keep Hogwarts open over the summer, of course, and we’d like to provide additional training courses for Defence, and anyone of age can —“

“Wait a minute,” Harry interrupted, raising a finger. “You want me to represent Slytherin.”

“Obviously,” Hermione said confidently. “If not you, who would I ask?”

“It’s not that I don’t want to,” Harry began awkwardly.

Padma commented to Hermione, “I told you it wouldn’t be easy.”

“No, listen,” Harry said. “I can’t be your pick for this. I’m sorry, Hermione. I can’t — I can’t give you the full reason right now, but —“

“See,” said one of the twins derisively.

“I’m not a good choice to lead Slytherin,” Harry said, ignoring him. “For one thing, I doubt I can stay at Hogwarts over the summer.” He had to look for and destroy the Horcruxes.

“You’re the king of snakes, Potter,” said the other twin. “You and Malfoy. The fact that you’d refuse just means that this is your true character, that’s all.”

“George, please,” Hermione said. To Harry, she added, “Why can’t you stay at Hogwarts?”

“I can’t say right now,” Harry replied. “I’m sorry. But look — there’s someone else you can ask.”

“Not Malfoy,” said Hermione immediately.

No, definitely not Draco. “I was thinking of Pansy, actually.”

Hermione furrowed her brow. “Parkinson?”

“It’s her mill,” Harry said with a conspiratorial grin, then stopped when all of them stared at him blankly. “Right. Pansy knows how to work the Slytherins. If you want the lot of us on your side, the best thing you can do is go through her.”

“They shouldn’t be on our side because they’ve been tricked into it. They should agree because it’s the right thing to do.”

“Sure,” Harry said, not in the mood for a lengthy argument that was predicated on misunderstandings. “Absolutely. Well, Pansy doesn’t _trick_ people — anyway. Hermione. Just — try it, okay? I can pass the word to her later today.”

***

Pansy indulged in some superficial grumbling about the extra work at first, but Harry could tell that she was in, even though it meant she would have to cooperate with not only Hermione, but Padma.

“This will be good for my first-years,” she admitted. “If someone hexes you then you hex back, of course, but there isn’t always a solution if the rest of the school is hissing at you and calling you a murderer.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “I hadn’t heard of this.”

“It hasn’t been so bad as to be unmanageable, so far,” Pansy said. “Partly because you’re the exalted Chosen One —“ she made a funny gesture with her fingers, as if to imply being the Chosen One came with sparkles — “and partly because I’ve been making reports to Professor Snape; each time one of those brats tries something, they lose twenty points in Potions the next day.”

Harry smothered his laughter with a cough.

Pansy went on earnestly, “I’ve been worried about this. I had a nightmare the other night; in it, everyone was telling us to leave, and then there were only three Houses.” She stared into the common room fire, flicking her wand at it so that it flashed green. Not the green of Floo travel, but the rich forest and lake green that was on all the tapestries along the wall. “We can’t let it come to that.”

***

On a sunny day in June Hermione’s proposal was made official to the school and wizarding Britain. McGonagall was the one who announced it, as Dumbledore was not present. Members of the Order arrived to begin the transition, coaxing the castle to grow new rooms and rearrange some of the old ones, posting guards at hidden entrances, bringing in extra supplies for the hospital wing. Classes were cancelled for the day. Exams were cancelled for the year.

Everyone was getting ready for arrivals, and Harry was preparing to depart.

“I think I’d better get an expandable bag, rather than a trunk,” he said absently to Draco, rummaging through his drawers. “Do you have one? Also, do you think Pansy would look after Hedwig for me?”

“Hm,” said Draco unhelpfully. “Potter, do you even have a _plan_?”

“Find Horcruxes somehow, then destroy them,” Harry summarised.

“That’s not a plan.”

“We have a few leads.”

“It’s still not a _plan_,” Draco insisted. “I don’t understand. No — I do understand about the Horcruxes, and I do understand that you’re a target, because of the prophecy, so I can see why you’d rather go elsewhere for the summer. But you’re acting as though you have to work alone.”

“Not _alone_,” Harry said, and faltered. “I mean — you are coming with me, aren’t you?”

“I’ll turn you into a tadpole if you so much as doubt me, Potter, but that’s not what I meant.”

“We can’t spread knowledge of the Horcruxes,” Harry told him. “I’ve been thinking maybe I should tell Hermione — and it’d be safe to tell Ron and Pansy, too, if we need to, but they need to stay here.”

Draco said flatly, “Tell whoever you think can keep it a secret. _I’m_ referring to Dumbledore. He’s searching for the Horcruxes too, isn’t he?”

Harry hesitated, and turned away. “Draco, about that.” It took effort to get the words out. “He’s going to die.”

_CRACK_. Kreacher appeared.

“What —“ Draco said, his face washed clean of expression, like Harry had dumped a bucket of ice cold water over him.

“Master,” Kreacher said at the same time, “Kreacher has seen another enter the Room.”

Harry walked over to Draco and put a hand on his arm. Draco grabbed onto it almost painfully. To Kreacher, Harry said, “It’s probably one of the Order members, or Hermione again. They’re going through the castle at the moment.”

“It is someone else,” Kreacher said. “A girl in Slytherin House.”

“Oh.” Harry frowned. “Maybe it’s Pansy?”

“Kreacher saw her open the door to the Room of Hidden Things. The door sealed itself when she closed it.”

“Room of Hidden Things?”

“That is what this abode’s elves know it as,” Kreacher explained. “Many objects over the centuries have been hidden within it.”

Harry and Draco exchanged a look. Harry remembered — the silent waterfall, Draco’s lips — he tore his gaze away.

Draco said, a sort of hammered stillness in his tone, “Theo wouldn’t leave a note like that for no reason. Maybe it’s not Pansy.”

“Will Master be needing to investigate?” Kreacher asked.

“Yes,” Harry said, deciding. “Take us.”

The corridor wasn’t empty when Kreacher apparated them in.

“Merlin’s pants!” said Ron, jumping. “Harry?! I thought you couldn’t apparate in Hogwarts — Hermione’s always going on about it.”

“House-elf magic, Ronniekins,” said one Weasley twin.

“Are you actually a stalker, Potter?” said the other.

The three of them were standing there patting the wall, as though they were looking for the door to the Room. One of the twins was holding the Map.

“Someone’s in there,” Harry told them shortly. “A Slytherin girl, apparently. She’s sealed it.” He put a finger to his mouth. “Shh. Can you see who it is on the Map?”

“He _is_ a stalker,” said the first twin.

“The Map can’t see anyone nearby except for us,” replied the second.

“All right, well … I guess we’ll just have to wait for them to come out.”

“Er, Harry,” Ron said uncertainly. “You’re not really stalking a girl, are you?”

“Do you become more stupid every year, Weasley?” drawled Draco. Immediately, the twins’ animosity focused on him. One of them drew his wand.

“Stop it,” Harry commanded, shoving his shoulder forcibly in front of Draco’s.

At that moment, there was a sound from beyond the wall. A huge crash, like a small mountain of random objects had toppled over. It was accompanied by a high-pitched shriek, then several smaller crashes.

“Okay,” Ron quipped. “There’s definitely a girl in there.”

All of them stared at the wall.

Minutes passed. Suddenly, a door appeared, just as if it had been there all along. It opened.

“_Rosier_?” Draco said incredulously.

It _was_ Rosier. She gasped loudly upon seeing them, but then stuck up her nose into the air in the way Harry remembered from the Quidditch tryouts.

“What are you doing here?” Harry asked.

“It’s none of your business,” she said waspishly. In her hands she was clutching at a piece of jewellery, a silver tiara with a brilliant blue gem in the centre. “Why are all of _you_ standing around here?”

Ron looked extremely uncomfortable. “Harry showed up and said that, er … Never mind. We were just trying to get into the Room as well, that’s all. Sorry to startle you.”

“Weasley,” Draco said urgently, “what does that Map of yours say? Is it Rosier?”

“Don’t order me around, ferret,” said the second twin, but the first looked over his shoulder and said, “Yeah, it says Rosier.”

Rosier was inching around Ron. There was a tear in the collar of her robes and her breathing was coming fast.

Ron went around to look at the map as well. “Yep, definitely Rosier. Yvonne Rosier.”

_Yvonne_ Rosier. Harry and Draco glanced at each other.

Rosier bolted.

“_Impedimenta_,” Harry cast, but Rosier had her wand out, too, and she blocked the jinx. “Stop her!” he shouted at the Weasleys. Draco was already sprinting. Harry followed, flinging more spells as he ran.

Rosier pelted down the corridor and turned right, dodging and shielding in turns. She reached the staircase leading to the sixth floor and slid down the banister. Draco sent a Hurling Hex at her that partially connected; she screamed and tumbled down the last three steps, losing her grip on the tiara, which bounced across the stone floor. Retching, she pushed herself back up and lunged for it.

Something flew over Harry’s head and landed directly beside her. It was a colourful cube, about the size of a Snitch and smoking slightly with orange fumes. Rosier stared at it for a beat, then, her grip on the tiara once again secured, made as if to kick it away from her.

Just before her foot connected, the cube exploded. Harry blinked as he drew level: the ground beneath Rosier had turned into something resembling quicksand. She was steadily sinking.

“_Incarcerous_,” Draco snapped, taking advantage of her shock.

“_Accio Rosier’s tiara_,” Harry said. Nothing happened. Rosier glared at him. He glared back, and flicked his wand again. “_Stupefy_.” Nonverbally, he cast _Levicorpus_. Methodically, he levitated her away from the quicksand and lowered her back down.

“There’d better be a good explanation for this,” came the voice of one of the twins.

“Thanks for your help,” Harry said, prying the tiara away from Rosier’s fingers. “And there is. This isn’t Rosier, the first-year. This is Rosier’s older sister, who graduated the year before. She was in your year. It must be Polyjuice.” The tiara had delicate filigree patterning and was undoubtedly of high craftsmanship. Something about it made him feel ill. “We’d better take her to McGonagall, if Dumbledore still isn’t back yet.”

***

McGonagall was highly unimpressed, even when the Polyjuice wore off, probably because Harry could only tell her half the story.

“We’ve just opened Hogwarts to refugees, Mr Potter,” she said. “Miss Rosier may very well have arrived today to see her sister.”

“She took something from the Room of Hidden Things,” Harry said, grinding his teeth. “She’s under _Polyjuice_. Doesn’t that strike you as suspicious?”

“While it is true that use of Polyjuice has been expressly forbidden,” McGonagall replied, “it does not merit assault. And from the sound of things, Miss Rosier might merely have gone to retrieve something that belongs to her in the first place.”

“Then she wouldn’t _run_ the way she did, Professor,” Harry protested with exasperation.

Help came from an unexpected source. The twins said: “We agree with Potter.”

“There was something off about her behaviour.”

“We should wake her up and interrogate her.”

McGonagall pursed her lips, but she pointed her wand at Rosier. “_Rennervate_.”

Rosier blinked her way to consciousness. She jerked upright in the chair, hand reaching for a wand that wasn’t there.

“Potter,” she said, eyes darting around McGonagall’s office, searching for a way out.

“You’re not Marked,” Harry said calmly. He’d checked, as soon as she’d returned to her own body. “But Voldemort sent you, didn’t he?”

“Don’t say the name!” she wailed over him. “Don’t!”

Unrelenting, he asked again: “He did, didn’t he?”

“He’s got Keena,” she cried hopelessly. “He’s got her in the dark. I had to. It’s just a stupid piece of cursed jewellery. Potter, give it back. If I take it to him he’ll let Keena go. She’s not even twelve yet. She’s scared of the dark. Potter, please.”

Her eyes were wide and bloodshot, her lips cracked. Harry said, pushing away emotion, “You’ve been pretending to be her since — when? January?” He thought over the months. “That’s why Rosier — why you wouldn’t eat at mealtimes. Pansy was worried sick. Dumbledore said that they’d implemented a way to detect Polyjuice. It was in the food, wasn’t it?”

“On the cutlery,” said McGonagall faintly. “A harmless solution that would react with boomslang and knotgrass to make you nauseous, enough to go to the hospital wing, or to dissuade you from taking another dose. If the solution interacted enough with Polyjuice, it would eventually reverse the transformation.”

Rosier snarled. “Let me _go_, Potter. Give me back the diadem. It’s not even useful for the war. The Dark Lord called it a trifle. He thinks it’s a great joke that my sister’s life is worth a mere trifle to him. To send me searching through a room of trash for months while he tortures her. Please. After he lets us go I’ll take Keena and run, or — or I’ll come back and work for this side. Please —“

Ron swore softly.

“Diadem,” Harry repeated. “You called it a diadem.” That confirmed it, then. He turned to McGonagall. “I need to speak to Dumbledore. Where is he?”

“He should be back soon,” McGonagall replied. “Mr Potter —“

“You heartless beast!” Rosier screamed, tears of frustration and anguish running down her cheeks. “Give it _back_ —“ She leapt from the chair, hands outstretched like claws.

“_Stupefy_,” Draco cast. She collapsed in a heap.

Ron swore again.

Harry drew in a trembling breath, mind racing. “I have to — Professor, I know that there’s a way for Order members to contact someone with a Patronus. Could you teach me?”

McGonagall returned Rosier to her chair. She said, voice troubled, “The incantation is _Patronus Ystica_, and the wand movements are thus.” She demonstrated. “But it is not easily learnt, even for someone used to manifesting a corporeal Patronus. I will contact the Headmaster for you, Mr Potter.” And she did so; a shining cat bounded, quicksilver, onto her shoulder, and she whispered to it. It turned through the air as though around a corner and disappeared. “Now,” said McGonagall, “we must —“

She stopped abruptly. The cat, barely gone two seconds, had reappeared and was shaking its head in a very human-like manner.

“That’s strange,” she murmured.

The door to her office flew open with a bang.

It was Pomfrey, so panicked that she was almost unrecognisable. “Minerva,” she gasped. “Come quickly. Albus is back.”

***

McGonagall left Ron and the twins to look after Rosier. Harry guessed that she would have left Draco, too, if she’d thought her orders had any chance of being obeyed. Clearly she didn’t, as she didn’t try.

Dumbledore was lying on a conjured pallet in his office, a stream of senseless words coming out of his mouth. His eyes were half-open, but he didn’t appear to be fully conscious. Fawkes sat by his head, trilling in distress.

Snape had swept everything off Dumbledore’s desk and covered it instead with potions ingredients and cauldrons. He, too, was muttering to himself, but it was with a hyper-focused sense of purpose.

“Professor,” Draco said, as soon as he took in the situation, “I can help —“

“Grind the wormwood to extra fine powder,” Snape instructed, not even looking at him. “Touch nothing else.”

Harry knelt down next to Dumbledore. He looked like a raving old man.

“How did this happen?” McGonagall asked.

“Severus said that he found him like this,” Pomfrey answered. “We think Fawkes brought him back, but we don’t know where from.”

McGonagall cast several spells on Dumbledore. She paled further with each one. “Severus,” she said shakily.

“It’s a powerful poison,” Snape said, still without looking up. “I’ve already counteracted its more immediate surface effects.” He threw something into the cauldron in front of him and stirred it seven times clockwise, seven times anticlockwise. “But at this point, there is no cure. He arrived back here too late.” He sounded remarkably clinical.

“No cure?” Pomfrey repeated. “Severus, you cannot mean that — that —“

“Poppy,” McGonagall said, quietly. “You must have cast the diagnostic spells, too.”

“Done,” Draco said. “The wormwood, sir —“

Snape inspected it, then with his wand drew the powder from the bowl in such a way that it hung like a fine sheet in the air. He sent it cascading in folds into a second cauldron, which sparked and hissed. As he did so, he said, “With luck, he will regain alertness with this potion, but there is nothing else that can be done. He has, at most, another ten hours.”

***

At Dumbledore’s request, Snape and McGonagall allowed Harry to speak to him alone.

“Sir,” Harry said. It seemed easy to show Dumbledore respect now that he was truly and actively dying. “I have one of the Horcruxes. Ravenclaw’s diadem.” He took it out of his robe pocket and explained, as concisely as he could, about Rosier.

McGonagall had transformed the pallet into a padded recliner, and they had manoeuvred Dumbledore into a sitting position, but it was clear Dumbledore did not have the strength to hold himself up. His posture sagged.

Yet Snape’s potion had done its work. Dumbledore’s gaze was sharp. He said, “Then Voldemort must be aware of, or at least suspect, that we are hunting Horcruxes. Perhaps he thought to inspect the others after he failed to find the diary he’d entrusted to Lucius at Malfoy Manor, and discovered that the ring was missing.” He closed his eyes in a spasm of pain. “Harry, in my own pocket, now. The left one.”

It was a golden locket adorned with a glittering, serpentine ‘S.’ “Slytherin’s locket,” Harry said, eyes wide. “Sir, you managed to —“

“I’m afraid not,” Dumbledore said. “I felt it as I came to; or rather, I did not feel it. There is no malice or magic in that trinket. Open it, Harry.”

Harry did, and found the note inside. He read it out loud to Dumbledore.

“R.A.B.,” Dumbledore repeated. “Alas, poor Regulus.”

“Regulus? Regulus Black?”

“It must be,” came the answer.

“Then — then does that mean the locket is destroyed? Does Voldemort know? If he’s gathering his Horcruxes …”

“I do not know if Regulus knew how to destroy a Horcrux,” Dumbledore said. “As for Voldemort, there was a fresh layer of dark magic over the cave where this fake was guarded, so it is exceedingly likely that he knows. I should have been more cautious, as soon as I noticed. Arrogance, Harry, it —“ he coughed weakly, and stopped to breathe. “But this diadem is genuine. You must destroy it at once.”

Harry had already thought about how. “The basilisk fang destroyed the diary, didn’t it? So — I can open the Chamber of Secrets again.”

“That might be the safest way,” Dumbledore agreed. He added intently, “Horcruxes have innate regenerative magic. They must be destroyed beyond repair. The Killing Curse would work, too, on a living body.”

“Okay,” Harry said. “For Nagini, right? I understand, sir.”

Another spasm of pain lanced through Dumbledore’s face. He said, “I’m sorry, Harry.”

“It’s —“ Harry grimaced. “You shouldn’t apologise, sir. Not now.”

“No,” Dumbledore conceded. “I suppose it’s too late.” He turned to look at his silver instruments, which Snape had moved onto the floor. “There is another thing you should know. Gellert did succeed in acquiring a Deathly Hallow.” With great effort, he raised a finger. His wand slid out of his sleeve and floated in front of Harry. “The Elder Wand, the most powerful wand in existence. Will you take it?”

Harry recoiled. “I don’t want it.”

“No?” The wand spun languidly. “With it, you will be able to perform such feats of magic other wands cannot hope to achieve, Harry.”

“I have my own wand,” Harry said firmly.

There was a dry sound that must have been Dumbledore’s laughter. The wand dropped back down. “Then I will discuss its disposal with Severus. It must not fall into Voldemort’s possession.” He coughed again. “Will you call Severus for me?”

“All right.” Harry stood up, turning to the door.

“You were never what I expected, Harry,” whispered Dumbledore from behind him. “But I think that on this day I finally know that you are indeed your parents’ son.”

Even while dying, Dumbledore could not stop testing him. Harry grit his teeth and said: “I was never anyone else.”


	22. Chapter 22

Once more, Draco accompanied him down to the Chamber of Secrets. The Horcrux screeched as it died, a horrible, agonising howl that had an almost physical property, like a tainted touch. Harry wanted badly to scrub a layer off his skin to be free of it.

They gathered up all the basilisk fangs they could and went back up. The castle was still bustling; news of Dumbledore’s condition had not yet spread. To avoid questions about their unusual luggage, Harry cast Disillusionment Charms over them both.

Thankfully, their dormitory was empty, Harry’s half-packed belongings still strewn all over his bed.

Draco, who had been mostly silent while they had been in the Chamber, said, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“When I said he was going to die,” Harry replied tiredly, “I didn’t mean within the day. I didn’t know that was going to happen. But I did know there was a time limit.” He explained about the ring and its curse.

Draco just looked at him.

Harry relented. “I didn’t tell you, because I thought it too big a secret. I thought that … No, I won’t make excuses, Draco. I should have told you.”

Draco sat down on his bed, bent forward to the floor. Harry went over and knelt by him. He put a hand on Draco’s knee.

After a while, Draco leaned back and acquired the shadow of a smirk. “Well, Potter? Are you going to beg for forgiveness?”

“Do you want me to?” Harry asked sincerely, then, when Draco made no reply to the affirmative, raised an eyebrow.

The tension broke; they laughed at each other.

“Draco,” Harry said, growing serious once more, “you were right. I don’t have a proper plan. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Achingly gentle, Draco smoothed back Harry’s hair. “I’m well accustomed to your clueless ways, you crazy idiot.”

***

As news of Dumbledore’s death broke like a tidal wave over the school, Harry told Hermione and Ron about the Horcruxes in an empty classroom near Gryffindor tower.

“If,” he said, “if something happens to Draco and I, then it’ll fall to the two of you. Pansy can be trusted as well. I know it seems like she gossips, and she does, but she knows how to keep a secret when it matters.”

Ron looked struck by something. “Hang on a sec, mate. I’ll be right back.” He ran off.

“Oh, _Harry_,” Hermione said, and she enveloped him in a hug. “I had no idea —“

“It’s not so bad,” he tried to reassure her. “We’ve gotten rid of the diary, the ring and the diadem. I’m going to try and track down the locket, see if Regulus Black managed to destroy it — and then there’s the cup and the snake. Dumbledore said that seven was likely, so …”

“We can try to speak to Slughorn,” Hermione offered. “If he has information … His life is on the line as well.”

“Okay.” Harry nodded. He handed her a sack lined with dragonhide. “Some of the basilisk fangs from the Chamber. Be careful handling them, they’re still extremely sharp. You’ll need them to destroy the Horcruxes. Just in case.”

“Harry!” Ron called. He came back through the door, panting slightly, waving a tiny vial. “It’s, it’s not much. I gave the rest to family. Sorry it’s not more.”

It was Felix Felicis, a single molten drop of treasure. “Are you sure?” Harry asked.

“Completely,” Ron said, pushing it into Harry’s palm and closing his fingers around it. “Take it. And this, too.” He got out a small rough canvas bag and shoved it at Harry. “Best not tell Fred and George I gave this to you, they keep saying they’re difficult to mass produce. Quicksand Caches. You saw one in action with Rosier. Twist one around the middle and it’ll detonate after ten seconds.”

“Thanks, Ron.”

Ron grabbed his arm. “You’ll be all right, Harry.”

“I’m going to look into leads, too,” Hermione said resolutely. “And we’ll have Order members gathering intel as well, even if they can’t know about the Horcruxes. I’ll get word to you, Harry, if I come across anything.”

***

They left right after the funeral, walking directly out the main gates even as others entered. Harry didn’t want to make a spectacle of his departure, but he needed to be seen leaving; he wanted Voldemort’s attention divided as much as possible. As it was, the mood was heavy, and no one tried to waylay them.

“But how is it a _magic_ castle?” he overheard a Muggle man ask his wife, a witch. “How can a building be magic? But oh, it does look very impressive …” He got out a disposable Muggle camera and tried to snap a picture, then lowered it and frowned.

“I told you to leave that at the house,” the witch was saying, tugging on his sleeve. “It won’t work here. Dear, it’s very important that you don’t wander off when we go inside. Are you listening?”

“C’mon,” Draco said. Harry started, and continued down the path.

“I thought that with Dumbledore gone, Hermione’s proposal might not work,” Harry said quietly. “But it is, still.”

“Sign of the desperate times, Potter,” Draco said flippantly, but they both knew that it was true.

Once they were on the outskirts of Hogsmeade, Harry held out his hand. Draco took it. Harry apparated them directly to the front step of Grimmauld Place.

“Not bad,” Draco assessed, patting his body down.

Harry rolled his eyes. “Got all of your important bits?”

“You know if the Ministry were still functioning you’d get a warning for apparating without a license.”

“Yeah, well. Not much choice.” Harry brought out their trunks and unshrunk them. The house was completely silent. “Kreacher!” he called.

Kreacher appeared. “Master returns!”

“Only briefly, I’m afraid,” Harry told him grimly. “I’m not sure we can trust the Fidelius on this house now that Dumbledore’s gone. Kreacher, you’ll have to help us search.”

“What is Master searching for?” Kreacher asked.

“Something that looks like this,” Harry said, and got out the fake locket.

***

Kreacher dove into his cupboard under the sink; for the next fifteen minutes they could hear him in there, moving things around with increasing desperation. “Gone,” came the cry, and then again: “It’s gone!”

“Are you sure you had it in there?” Harry asked, bending down and squinting.

Kreacher stormed out, twisting his ears. “Kreacher saved it! Kreacher saved it when it was thrown away! It was Master Regulus’ most precious locket … Kreacher must not fail him, Kreacher must not fail him …” He disappeared back into the cupboard.

“Perhaps he misplaced it in another room,” Draco said doubtfully.

“Let’s go look,” Harry suggested.

They split up: Harry to the attic and Draco to the cellars, planning to meet somewhere in the middle. The house did its best to help; it drew back all the curtains to let the light in, and sometimes the doors nudged themselves closer together, so that Harry did not have to walk as far. Still, it was hard work; after a solid day of searching they reconvened and estimated that they had only gone through a quarter of the rooms. They slept for barely five hours before getting up to continue.

Kreacher was only marginally helpful. He kept popping in at random intervals to pull open a drawer or a cabinet door and vanishing again. The eighth time he appeared, Harry happened to be balanced precariously on the back of a chair, and was so startled he crashed to the ground.

“You need to stop that,” he said, sitting up and rubbing the back of his head. “Think, instead. Could you have moved it somewhere? Maybe when the house was rearranging itself?”

“Kreacher would not move Master Regulus’ locket,” Kreacher insisted.

“Okay,” Harry accepted. “Then maybe — maybe someone from the Order took it?”

A pause. Kreacher’s eyes went ridiculously wide. “The thief! It must have been the thief!”

“Thief?” Harry gasped. “Mundungus?”

“Kreacher does not know the name of the thief,” Kreacher spat murderously. “Kreacher caught him, and made him give back everything he had taken, but he must have hidden the locket.” Moaning, he collapsed in a heap. “Kreacher has failed Master Regulus.” He said it over and over.

“Kreacher,” Harry interjected. “Kreacher, hey. Don’t. Calm down. Draco and I are going to find the locket. We’ll destroy it, just like Regulus wanted, I promise.”

But Mundungus had died, he remembered, drunk in a Muggle alleyway. What had Snape said? Nothing in his possession, not even a wand. Draco’s face clouded when Harry updated him, and they decided to finish checking the rest of the rooms anyway, just in case, but three days later, with hurting backs and stiff joints, had no choice but to admit the locket was assuredly not in Grimmauld Place.

“It could be anywhere,” Harry said in despair, sinking into a couch.

“His body was in a Muggle area,” Draco said. “Where, exactly?”

“McGonagall might know,” Harry said. “I’ll write her — or, no, actually. Hedwig’s at Hogwarts. I have a better idea.” He got out his wand. “_Patronus Ystica_.” An outline of his stag formed, then dissipated. “_Patronus Ystica_.” The stag came out, too bright, and was snuffed out like it had burnt too strong, too quickly. “_Patronus Ystica_.” This time, the stag’s light was steady. It bent its head to his face questioningly.

“It’s thoroughly unfair how easily you did that,” Draco grumbled.

“Er,” Harry said to the stag. “Do you know McGonagall? She should be at Hogwarts.” The stag stamped its foot.

“It’s a part of you,” pointed out Draco. “Of course it knows McGonagall.”

“Right. Okay. Can you go ask her, then, if she knows any details about Mundungus Fletcher’s death? It’s important.”

With an affirming twitch of its head, the stag jumped over the couch into nothingness.

“_Patronus Ystica_,” Draco tried. Nothing happened. He sighed.

A few minutes later, McGonagall’s cat glided into the room. It said in McGonagall’s voice, “Arabella Figg was the one who reported Mundungus’ death. She would know more. The news came through Muggle channels.”

“Who’s Arabella Figg?” Draco asked curiously.

“She’s a Squib,” Harry said, as the cat faded away. “She testified for me before the Wizengamot. D’you remember? Before fifth year. She lives near the Dursleys.”

***

As soon as he apparated them to Privet Drive, right into Mrs Figg’s back garden, where he hoped their sudden appearance would not be seen, he could tell something was wrong. It was a cloudy afternoon, with a bit of wind, the temperature tolerable, but everything about their surroundings was too quiet, like the entire street was holding its breath, watching. He couldn’t hear any cars or birds. The hair on the back of his neck stood up.

There was a noise from Mrs Figg’s house. A cat ran out through the flap on the back door.

“Draco,” Harry said, still holding his hand. “I think we’d better —“

The door banged open. Mrs Figg stood there in a stained white apron. Several more cats poured out into the garden. “Harry Potter,” she said, shock in every syllable.

Relief filled him. “Mrs Figg,” he began awkwardly, “sorry to intrude on you like this —“

“You apparated?” she asked sharply. “Idiot boy. Come in quickly. Hurry!”

They followed her inside. It was more cramped than Harry remembered, but the walls were still covered with photographs of her cats. Draco stared at these with a horrified but intrigued expression. He caught Harry’s eye and said, in the manner of imparting vital information, “They’re really not moving, Potter.”

Harry could smell baking from the kitchen, but the aroma was stifled by the ever-present scent of cabbage. Cats scattered at their feet, meowing. “Quickly now,” Mrs Figg said again, and led them straight past the living room to the front door. She opened it a crack and peeked outside, then opened it fully and gestured for them to go through it.

Was she that eager for them to leave? “Sorry,” Harry tried again, “I know we showed up suddenly, but there’s a good reason —“

“You still have the Trace on you, Harry,” she said impatiently. “Come on, we have to go.” She took his arm and dragged him outside.

“The Trace?” Harry said, as they half-ran, half-walked down the street. “But the Ministry’s fallen, and anyway I don’t think it matters —“

“_He_ could still make use of it.” Mrs Figg tugged him up the Dursley’s driveway and rang the bell in rapid succession multiple times. “Petunia! Petunia!”

“Is that you, Arabella?” came Aunt Petunia’s muffled voice. “Goodness, there’s no need to buzz so much, I —“ she opened the door. If the situation had been less tense, Harry would have laughed at the look on her face.

“Hello, Aunt Petunia,” he said quietly.

“_You_,” she said simultaneously.

“Let us through,” said Mrs Figg rudely, and shoved her way inside, still pulling Harry and by extension Draco along with her.

It was a weekday; it seemed like Petunia was alone at home. Shaking with anger, she demanded, “What’s the meaning of this, Arabella? He’s not due back for another week, at least, and frankly with the state of things —“

Mrs Figg talked over her. “Harry, it’s likely that they detected your apparition and know exactly where you are. You have to stay here. Under the bond of blood, it’s safe here until you turn seventeen.”

“We already have a place to stay,” Harry told her, letting Draco go and walking around Petunia to peer out the window. “Malfoy can apparate us back, if you think it’s dangerous for me to do it; he’s already of age.” There was no movement on the street, but still the sense that something was off persisted. “We came here to ask you about Mundungus.”

“No, Harry,” Mrs Figg said intently. “This house is still your home until you turn seventeen. It is, isn’t it? Tell us.”

He saw a flicker on the asphalt, like the residue of a heat wave. Distantly, the alarm of a car went off, high-pitched and distressed. From behind the opposite house a hooded figure emerged, and began to cross the road. Petunia made an odd sound caught between a whimper and a scream.

“Harry,” Mrs Figg said, and it sounded like begging.

Gripping the thin gauze curtain, Harry said, “This is my home, where I grew up.”

“Your Aunt Petunia is happy to have you here,” Mrs Figg said.

“That’s — I — yes. You’re welcome here,” Petunia said rapidly.

The hooded figure stopped in the middle of the road and turned to the side, as if listening to something, then, with a twist, disapparated. Further down the street, a man opened his door and yelled a complaint. The car alarm stopped. Harry let out the breath he’d been holding.

Silence reigned. Eventually, Petunia said, voice slightly shaky but already building righteous indignation, “Explain yourselves. What is all this, all this nonsense? Strange stories in the news, all that sensationalism about the murder-suicides and the weather and, and — it’s _your_ fault, isn’t it?”

“It’s Voldemort,” Harry told her bluntly. “The Ministry of Magic has fallen; Dumbledore is dead.”

Petunia stumbled back and hit the wall. Her eyes frantically darted to Mrs Figg and then Draco and finally back to him in turn. “And so you — it’s over, then? What’s going to happen?”

“It’s not over at all.” Tired of standing around at the front entrance, Harry strode into the living room. The television was on, but muted; some daytime sitcom was playing. “And what’s going to happen is that I’m going to kill Voldemort.” He turned around. They were all staring at him.

“Accustomed to k-killing people, are you?” Petunia said. “Is that what you’ve been learning, all those years at that, that _school_?” Her voice grew more high-pitched. “Lily, it changed her, too. She spoke of your world like it was heavensent, like there could be nothing better, like it was a place of miracles. But I knew: it was full of danger. Before everything happened, I already knew. That _horrid_ boy — it’s not right. It’s not natural, and it killed her, and here you are now, seventeen years later, all grown up, surrounded by murder and death.”

Harry twitched. Draco moved to him. Harry said, “I don’t have _time_ for this — I need to — look, Aunt Petunia. It seems like I’ll need to stay here for a few weeks. Less, maybe.” Mindful of the lurking threat, he added, “For now, this is still my home. There are some things I need to ask Mrs Figg. I promise we won’t get in your way.”

“‘We’?” Petunia echoed. She pointed at Draco. “_He_ isn’t —“

“He is,” Harry said.

Petunia made a disdainful noise. “Well, with no warning at all — we don’t have room, the guest bedroom is under renovation, and I certainly won’t have one of — won’t have him sleeping on the couch.”

The mental image of Draco sleeping on the Dursley’s couch blossomed in Harry’s mind, and he bit back an inappropriate laugh. Draco himself looked completely appalled at the idea. Harry said quickly, “We can sleep in my room.”

Nostrils flaring, Petunia said, “I suppose I can take out an old mattress from the attic, but there’s hardly enough space on the floor —“

“We’ll share the bed,” Harry told her. “It’s fine. Is there anything else? Money? I can send you some, once this is all over. Only, our business is rather urgent, and it sort of involves the lives of everyone here, as well as all of Britain and perhaps the world, so if it pleases you I’d like to get on with it.”

He’d never spoken to her in quite this manner before — not quite this dismissive, not quite this direct. He could see that it was a shock to her, that when she looked at him she was seeing a perfect stranger, despite their having lived under the same roof for years and years. She’d never known him, never thought that there was anything worth knowing.

Petunia’s mouth opened, then closed, and finally she turned away, saying only, “I must call Vernon and warn him.” She disappeared down the corridor and up the stairs.

“Well,” said Mrs Figg uncomfortably after a beat.

Draco had drifted towards the coffee table, and now he picked up the television remote, pushing at the buttons randomly, waving it like a wand, a curious expression on his face. Suddenly, the sound of the sitcom blared out at an intolerable volume. Mrs Figg jumped.

Harry walked over to the television and turned it off. It looked like the VCR had been in the middle of recording and Draco had stopped it, which probably meant that they’d just worsened their case with Petunia. Well, whatever.

“Right,” he said brusquely, once Draco had put the remote back down. “About Mundungus Fletcher.”

***

“His body was found in an alleyway in South London, near a series of bars,” Mrs Figg explained. Harry had brewed them all some tea, and they’d settled down at the dining table. A distant part of his brain was faintly aware of the strange incongruous image he and Draco painted, dressed as they still were in casual robes, sipping from Petunia’s everyday china, the Muggle wall clock (entirely lacking in hands that told of celestial alignments) ticking away in the background.

“I heard he was missing his wand,” Harry said.

“Yes,” Mrs Figg confirmed. “That’s what Lucas said, anyway.” At Harry’s look of inquiry, she added, “Lucas is a friend of mine. He works at the morgue. He’d met Dung a few months ago, and remembered his face, so when his body showed up — this wasn’t reported in the news, you understand.” She had her hand around her teacup; her knuckles whitened momentarily. “There have been so many unusual deaths recently, and in any case — Dung’s death looked like a robbery. His body had stab wounds from a knife, there was nothing on his possession. He was drunk. He was often drunk.”

“Stab wounds,” Harry said slowly. “That’s what killed him?”

Mrs Figg nodded. “That was what the autopsy said. Lucas is a Muggle — he doesn’t know about magic. He didn’t see anything strange with the body.”

“Stab wounds, though,” Draco said, frowning. “From a Muggle knife, not cursed? Seems like an unlikely cause of death for an adult wizard.”

“He could have bled out, couldn’t he, without his wand?” said Harry.

“Maybe,” Draco said reluctantly. “If he’d been left there for days, unconscious. If his magic was weak.”

“The other option is that he was killed via magical means, disarmed in the process, and the stab wounds added later to disguise what had happened,” Harry said.

“Why bother, though?” questioned Draco. “There’s unusual deaths happening everywhere right now.”

“Why are you looking into Dung’s death?” asked Mrs Figg. “I’d — you know, we weren’t friends. I’d always thought that he’d die passed out in an alley somewhere, as unkind as it is to admit. It doesn’t seem that weird.”

“He stole something that we need to win the war,” Harry said to her carefully. “You don’t need to know exactly what. But it’s important that we determine if he was killed by a wizard, or a Muggle. If it was a Muggle, and they did it to rob him without knowing the true nature of what he had in his possession, then maybe we’ll have a better chance of recovering it.”

“Well I think it was from being stabbed,” Mrs Figg said resolutely.

“The Killing Curse doesn’t leave a mark,” Harry objected. “Even if his body didn’t show any signs —“

“No, Harry,” Mrs Figg interjected. “You see, Lucas was very clear about the loss of blood through the stab wounds. And I’m not an expert, mind, but I’ve learnt a thing or two over the years: once you’re dead your heart stops pumping. Once it stops pumping, the blood stops flowing. If Dung had been stabbed after he’d already died, he wouldn’t have lost so much blood.”

“It’d be better if we could see the body for ourselves,” Draco said.

Mrs Figg scoffed, “Experienced in post-mortem examinations, are you?” Without giving them a chance to answer, she waved her hand in dismissal and said: “It’s far too late, anyway. Long since cremated. Dumbledore came and filled out the paperwork himself, and if _he_ didn’t see anything unusual when he identified the body…”

“Then maybe we should have a look at where his body was found,” said Harry. “Where did you say it was?”

“South London,” Mrs Figg answered. “I’m not certain on the exact location. I think it was in Brixton. I can contact Lucas and see if he has the files, or knows someone who does. Hopefully he will. It’s, well. It’s been quite chaotic.”

“Please do so,” Harry said. “Thank you, Mrs Figg.”

She took a long sip of her tea, a troubled expression on her face. “Dumbledore was always so concerned about you, you know. And now he’s gone, and left it all to you.”

“Not all,” corrected Harry gently. He’d felt that way months ago, but he could see now that it wasn’t true. He thought of the Order, of Hermione, of Hogwarts, the stronghold. Of Draco. What they needed to accomplish could not be done alone, and he wasn’t alone.

“Still,” Mrs Figg said. “It’s not right. Except I suppose there’s no right in the world at the moment, and that’s the pickle of it.” She reached out across the table and touched the back of his hand. “Don’t worry, Harry. I’ll help you however I can. But I also want to say this: you place a lot of stock in magic, and I understand why. To the two of you, magic is everything, does everything. Yet, you must know that there is a great deal more to the world beyond humans, wizard and Muggle and Squib alike. Dung … he always drank more around this time of the year. I never liked him, but it was impossible to not see that he was — sometimes a man can give up, stop caring. It can be just for a night, but sometimes one night is enough. And if a wizard stops caring, won’t his magic do the same? I’ve never been able to cast a single spell, so maybe it’s not a question I can answer.” She looked at each of them in turn gravely. “What do you think?”

***

“I think she has a point,” Draco said that night, as they lay down to sleep.

Harry’s head hurt. After Mrs Figg had left, the evening had not been a restful one. Uncle Vernon had arrived home in a towering rage; his face had been pink the moment he came in through the front door. He’d yelled at Harry, and yelled at Petunia, and finally tried to yell at Draco, only for Draco to cast a Silencing Charm on him immediately.

“Are you aware,” Draco had drawled leisurely, “that due to recent events, the Ministry of Magic in this country has fallen, which means that if I were to — oh, I don’t know, turn you into a mayfly, no one would notice, and the rest of your life would be extremely brief?”

“Malfoy,” Harry had said warningly. “Let’s not.”

“Harry and I are going to stay here for a short period,” Draco went on with a cool smile, ignoring him completely. “During that time, I expect the both of us to be treated beautifully. In return, I will behave as a welcomed guest should, and also no one will have to experience life as an insect, although I’m sure you already know what that’s like in your own special way.” He flicked his wand.

With a great gasp, Vernon said, “You…! The both of you will behave yourselves!” He raised a stubby finger. “I’m telling you now, one toe out of line —“

Draco raised his wand again. Instant silence. “No. _I’m_ telling _you_. _I_ will behave in the manner befitting of a guest, but Harry will do whatever he pleases, because this is his home, too. You need to remember that, because his presence is the only reason why I haven’t squashed you beneath my shoe.”

Dinner, after that, had been … interesting. Neither Petunia nor Vernon had attempted conversation, and had instead sat in front of their meals with the tortured air of prisoners locked behind bars for a crime they hadn’t committed. Draco had talked instead, or rather urged Harry to talk, by method of inquiring after every Muggle contraption in his field of vision. Vernon had given a derisive snort when Harry had described the microwave as a ‘box which puts Warming Charms on leftover or pre-prepared meals,’ but hadn’t been so ambitious as to offer insight on what he found so funny.

The only blessing had been Dudley’s absence; Smelting wasn’t due to release its students until the second week of July, and Harry hoped that by that point they would be gone.

Now, he said, “You think that it was a Muggle?”

Draco shifted in the bed. It fit them both, but just barely. They’d enlarged it, but it was still much narrower than the four-poster beds at Hogwarts. The bedroom itself was small, and in any case was stuffed full to the brim with Dudley’s things. Petunia had apparently been imagining a wonderful future in which Harry no longer needed to occupy space in her house, and had begun to repurpose the room ahead of time. Draco had suggested extending the room itself, but Harry had refused. He wasn’t sure how a Muggle house would take it; not possessing the flexibility of wizarding residences, it was likely to collapse if they messed with its structure without proper planning and preparation.

Draco elaborated, “Magic is entangled with will. It makes sense that magic could give up, if the wizard it belonged to didn’t care.” Then he shifted again. “Shove over, will you?”

“Can’t,” Harry told him, slightly annoyed. “Stop poking me.”

Draco sighed theatrically. “We could apparate back to Grimmauld Place, you know. Sleep properly there.”

“Better not, I think,” Harry said, thinking of the bond of blood. “It might void the protection I have here, and make contacting Mrs Figg more difficult.” He added, to be safe, “This is my home.”

“Hm.” Draco turned onto his back. “Here,” he said softly, and pulled Harry’s arm across so that it was draped across his chest.

Harry stilled, his arm rising and falling with Draco’s breathing. “Are you doing this on purpose?”

“What?” Draco asked. “What do you mean? It’s not my fault your shoulders are so stupidly wide, Potter.”

“I’m talking about all this bloody flirting, you tosser,” Harry said.

“I beg your pardon?” Draco twisted his head to look at him.

“The smiling,” Harry began, “and the wearing my clothes and —“ he brought his arm up and let it drop down again in emphasis.

In the faint light coming in from the windows, he saw Draco’s brows furrow in confusion. “Am I not allowed to smile at you, Potter?”

Harry was already regretting bringing it up at all. “Explain the clothes, then.”

“The — clothes?” Draco repeated. “What — seriously, Potter. You thought I was flirting? I wasn’t.” His voice grew irritated. “I told you, I’m trying to sort myself out.”

“Are you,” Harry said, “still?”

“Yes,” came the reply, terse. Draco turned back to face the ceiling.

“You don’t think,” Harry said, and his nose was an inch from Draco’s neck, “that maybe you aren’t sending signals subconsciously?”

“What _I_ think is that you’re, you’re so obsessed with me that you’re seeing things that aren’t there. You’re hyper aware.”

“Hyper aware,” Harry echoed. He wrapped his arm more securely around Draco’s chest, drawing his hand up to Draco’s collarbone. “Things that aren’t there.” He closed his eyes and moved closer. He could feel Draco’s pulse point through his lips.

“Harry,” Draco whispered. “We agreed: we won’t.”

Harry let out a breath. “We’re not.”

“No?”

“No.”

“All right,” Draco said, believing him just like that, letting out a breath as well.

Unfortunately, Harry’s body had already started to react predictably, and given their positions, there was no doubt that Draco was aware of the development. But it wasn’t the first time they’d shared a bed, and, frankly, considering all the years of sharing a dormitory, not the first time they’d ignored what was going on with each other’s dicks, although no other time in the past had been quite so blatant. It was remarkable how unembarrassed he was, but he still needed a distraction — for his own sake — so he said, “D’you remember in first year, Draco, when we had our first flying lesson, and Madam Hooch said that your grip was wrong, and you were cross for the rest of the day?”

It took Draco a moment to adjust to the change of topic. “That woman is too much of a traditionalist; there’s nothing wrong with a reverse grip, as long as it personally works for you.”

Harry laughed soundlessly. “Right. You went on and on about that, and then just to show her you never changed your grip anyway.”

Draco’s tone implied the eye-roll. “Because there’s no _need_ to. What are you trying to say, Potter?”

“Nothing,” Harry said. “It’s just, it occurred to me. I remember seeing you fly for the first time — and I — I’d never flown. And the way you talked, you’d been born flying.”

“Yes, and that did me a whole lot of good, because now I’m the Slytherin Quidditch Captain,” said Draco sarcastically, but in a much milder manner than he might have during the day.

“I’ve always liked watching you fly,” Harry continued. “It occurred to me, you see, that we never flew together on the Slytherin team, and now we never will.”

“It _just_ occurred to you?”

“Yeah. You know?”

Draco didn’t answer for so long that Harry was halfway asleep when he finally spoke. “It’s your fault for not being sorted into Gryffindor. Then we could have played against each other.”

“You want to do it over?”

“You told me that all the Time Turners were destroyed, Harry,” murmured Draco into his hair.

“No way back?”

“None at all.”


	23. Chapter 23

Draco woke him up the next morning by dumping a pile of fabric — clothes, as it turned out — on his face.

“Wha…?” Harry said inarticulately, sitting up, rubbing his eyes. He glanced at the clock, squinting, then reached for his glasses. It was just before six in the morning.

Draco was rummaging through the wardrobe, making a variety of disapproving noises. His hair was wet; there was a towel around his hips and nothing else. He caught Harry’s eye and said, about as ruefully as possible for a Malfoy, “Don’t take this the wrong way: I am in fact trying to get dressed.” He took another shirt out of the wardrobe and held it up, index and thumb pinched at each shoulder, every other finger raised as though he feared contamination. “But everything in here is only fit to be set on fire. Did you actually _wear_ these, Potter? No, don’t answer that, I’m already getting a flashback from first year —“

Yawning loudly, Harry ran a hand through his hair and said, “They’re Dudley’s hand-me-downs.”

“Dudley,” Draco repeated, making a face. “The one you had to save from Dementors? The pig that’s in some of the family photos?”

A drop of water traced the curve of Draco’s shoulder. Harry looked away, shrugging. “We should ask Kreacher to bring over a trunk. Or —“ he got up off the bed — “no, actually, if we’re going to be going around Muggle London, we may as well go shopping. You’ll need proper Muggle attire.”

“If you think it safe to go to Gringotts for currency exchange,” Draco said slowly, but Harry was already kneeling to lift up the loose floorboard, reaching inside for the drawstring pouch he’d filled with rolls of money.

“Extra from arranging some of your Christmas presents over the years,” he explained. “Always thought it might come in handy at some point.” He threw a roll of twenties at Draco, then stepped around him to peer into the wardrobe himself, pushing aside Dudley’s enormous shirts until he found what he was looking for. “Here. I thought I’d left these lying around. They’re from a few years back, but you should be okay wearing it temporarily.”

Draco examined the hoodie and joggers critically. “I’ve never seen you wear these.”

That was because Harry had only ever worn them in the confines of Privet Drive, on those endless lonely summer days with nothing to do but homework, nothing to do but wait until Wiltshire, until Hogwarts. “Er,” he said. “Well. Try them, will you? They’re pretty comfortable.” He cleared his throat. “I’m going to have a shower as well.”

***

By the time noise of the Dursleys stirring began to sound from the upper floor, they’d already finished eating breakfast. Harry took the dirty dishes to the sink and got out his wand, but then remembered the Trace and washed them manually. Draco drifted away into the hall; Harry listened carefully, and heard the door to the cupboard under the stairs opening and closing. Even now, he knew the creak and groan of the hinges as intimately as he knew the dark behind his own eyelids. He wondered if he would ever forget.

After a little while, Draco came back without comment and leaned against the kitchen counter as Harry finished drying.

Harry said, “You can apparate us to the Leaky Cauldron. We’ll get some clothes at second-hand shops, and then we’ll …” he trailed off. The task ahead of them was enormous, and the more he thought about it the more impossible it seemed.

Draco seemed to know why he had stopped speaking. He only asked mildly, “Second-hand shops? Are there waistcoats in second-hand shops?”

The best that could be said about Draco Malfoy in joggers was that he looked nothing like Draco Malfoy. It was even worse than the jumper-and-jeans ensemble from January. And it was a good thing. The less they looked like themselves, the safer they would be. Harry said as much, and added, “It’ll be quicker, too.”

Unfortunately, it wasn’t as quick as he’d hoped. He’d forgotten to take into account the fact that this was the first time Draco had ever been exposed to so much Muggle clothing, and of so much variation.

“Look at this, Potter,” Draco kept saying. He was intrigued by multi-pocket cargo trousers, fascinated by denim jackets, puzzled by a tiger print onesie. At one point he tried to take about fifty items into the fitting room, and almost got into an argument with the shop’s manager about the limit of eight. He found a dark blue Hawaiian shirt with a pattern of constellations on it, and refused to let it go.

“Very enthusiastic, isn’t he?” said the shop assistant to Harry, as Draco unfolded a pair of ripped jeans and stuck his hand through one of the holes.

“Yeah,” Harry replied. “You should see the rest of his wardrobe.”

The shop assistant laughed politely. Harry smiled as well, but internally he was experiencing a revelation. In his mind’s eye he saw again their first meeting in Madam Malkin’s, when Draco had been getting his school robes fitted, young and rich and used to tailored clothing. Draco had always been well dressed. He’d sneered at Ron’s too-short robes in first year, and had generally seemed to project an image of being well versed in haute couture. Now Harry was realising that, perhaps, most of that had been Narcissa’s influence. She was the one who knew all the wizarding fashion designers, who was always wearing something new and of the season. In her absence, presented with so many choices, Draco very clearly had no earthly idea what he was doing.

Then again, if Harry had been in his shoes, Harry might have reacted in the same way. Muggles had at least a solid concept of robes, whereas there was nothing in wizarding culture that quite prepared you for gratuitous zippers.

They walked out of the shop with what must have been a sack full of clothes, far more than Harry had planned on purchasing. Draco had changed into the Hawaiian shirt with cargo trousers (useful, because its many pockets gave him a place to store his wand), and looked extremely pleased with himself.

“This is nothing like Diagon Alley,” he said, gesturing at the busy street.

“Of course not,” Harry said, eyeing Blockbuster Video as they passed it by.

“I mean that none of the shops are closed,” Draco said. “I thought it’d be more — sombre, given what’s been happening.”

Harry thought about it. “There are a lot of Muggles. Society can’t collapse that easily, and anyway we’ve been Obliviating them, haven’t we? Or the French have, rather.”

Draco was silent for a few minutes. Just as Harry was about to propose that they find a place to apparate back to Privet Drive, he said, “I want to see one of those moving pictures that tell a story, like portrait theatre. You said Muggles had them?”

“Er,” said Harry dubiously. “I mean, yeah, I suppose we can watch a movie.”

“What?” prompted Draco. “You don’t want to?”

It wasn’t that Harry didn’t want to — more that it felt like a hugely inappropriate thing to do when they were supposed to be saving the world. But it wouldn’t be helpful for them to sit in the smallest bedroom in Privet Drive and twiddle their thumbs, either. So he said, “I’ve never seen one in a cinema before.”

“Can we, then?”

They went and watched _Matilda_. It had been out for a while, and that combined with it being the middle of a weekday before school holidays officially began meant that they were the only people in the audience apart from a mother with two small children who all sat at the front, the boy and the girl shrieking with excitement at regular intervals. Which was fine, because Draco had no concept of cinema etiquette either, and kept poking Harry in the arm to give his opinion.

“Is she meant to be a witch?” he asked when Matilda blew up the television, and then, later, “Merlin, that’s not how levitation works. Her control is ridiculous for a six year old. How did the Muggles levitate everything, by the way? Can Muggles do levitation, even without magic? And _why_ — you know, if Dumbledore had ever thrown someone out a window, we would’ve been vindicated.”

He said less towards the end of the movie, and as the credits rolled Harry looked over and whispered incredulously, “Draco, are you _crying_?”

“No,” Draco lied, even though his eyes were definitely wetter than usual.

Harry said teasingly, “I didn’t know you were such a sucker for happy endings.”

“Shut up, Potter.” Draco reached over and seized the box of popcorn, grabbing the last handful. “It wasn’t that. I was thinking of —“ Harry hadn’t ever seen anyone eat popcorn so defensively before.

“Of what?” Harry asked.

“Shut up,” Draco said again, prickly. “Matilda should have gone to _Hogwarts_, and then she should have been in Slytherin, and then she should have turned her good-for-nothing father into an _insect_.”

Harry refrained from pointing out that Matilda would have been a Muggleborn. He said instead, “It turned out all right for her, in the end.”

“I guess.”

Hesitating, Harry added quietly, “It turned out all right for me, too, if you were wondering.”

The lights came back on. Several rows in front of them, the mother was trying to chivy her children into putting their shoes back on properly. Draco was silent.

“Shall we watch another?” Harry said.

***

It was almost dinner time when they got back. They had to ring the doorbell again to be let in, because Harry didn’t have a key, and he didn’t think the Dursleys would react well if they just spelled the lock open.

It meant suffering Petunia’s glare as they wiped their shoes on the doormat. She said, staring at the bags of clothes reprovingly, “I don’t know where the two of you went, but if you have so much free time to waste then one would hope that you could take your own messages. Arabella was here again.” She handed them a folded piece of paper, turned her nose up, and disappeared into the living room.

Harry read the note as they climbed the stairs. “It’s the information on where Mundungus was found dead,” he told Draco. “And Mrs Figg wants to know if we’d like to go with her to meet Lucas. She says he knows a detective who’s on the case.”

They dumped the bags of clothes on the enlarged bed and closed the door. Draco’s eyebrows were raised. He said, “A detective?”

“A Muggle Auror who solves crimes.”

“I know what a detective is, Potter. I was expressing disbelief that a detective, even a Muggle one, would be open to helping two strangers.”

“Maybe they’re as desperate as we are,” Harry said.

Draco made a neutral sound and began to take the clothes out of the bags. “Where are we keeping these?”

“Not here,” replied Harry, meaning the wardrobe. There wasn’t much point; since they now had a location from Mrs Figg, he couldn’t imagine needing to stay here for longer than a week. Saying so out loud, though, would be dangerous.

“But we’re not staying at Grimmauld Place either,” Draco said carefully, just as if he understood Harry’s unspoken dilemma. “We left our trunks there — shall I go fetch them?”

Yesterday, when they had apparated in, they’d brought little more than their wands. “Yeah, that’s a good point. Will you?”

While Draco was gone, Harry went over to Mrs Figg’s house to thank her for her note and set a time for tomorrow. His shadow on the pavement was long as he walked, and he found his steps quickening on the way back.

He couldn’t have been gone for longer than ten minutes, so he was caught quite off-guard when he heard screaming from within the house as he approached the front steps. It was Petunia’s voice, shrill and panicked.

Frantically, Harry rang the doorbell, getting out his wand. If he had to spell the lock open, then he had to spell the lock open, Trace be damned.

Before he could get the incantation out, the door swung open violently. Uncle Vernon was standing on the threshold, so livid he was practically purple. He dragged Harry in by the scruff of his neck, slammed the door shut, and yelled, “You did this, boy! You fix this right now!”

“I didn’t do anything,” Harry said reflexively, shoving Vernon’s hand away.

Petunia was still screaming. “Oh good god, Vernon, there’s another one, oh god —“

She was spraying a bottle of insecticide wildly at the wall, coughing at the fumes. Scattered around the hall were the bodies of several cupboard spiders, the type Harry had been very familiar with growing up. The insecticide, designed for other bugs, had made their movements lethargic but not killed them.

From the trail of small bodies, it was clear that the spiders were coming from the cupboard under the stairs. To prove him right, another one crawled out of one of the thin slits on the door.

Petunia had noticed him. She said shrilly, “You! I welcome you in, I let you eat our food — and this is how you think fit to repay us? Undo this right now!”

“I didn’t do it,” Harry said again. “Maybe you had an infestation and you didn’t know?”

“An infestation!” Petunia said derisively. “In _my_ house?”

“It’s summer,” said Harry. “It’s the season for bugs.”

“One or two, maybe,” Petunia said, lowering the insecticide and coming closer. There were beads of sweat on her forehead, and when she raised a finger her hand shook. “But not, not _twenty_, or however many this is. You did this, you or your — that companion of yours.” She spat, “_Fix_ this.”

Right on time, a crack sounded from the floor above. Both Petunia and Vernon jumped, looking upward in alarm.

“I thought I heard the same noise a few minutes ago,” Vernon muttered to Petunia. “What was it?” He rounded on Harry. “If you’re breaking things, boy —“

“No one’s breaking anything, you stupid Muggle,” Draco drawled, coming down the stairs. He took in the scene in one sweep and smirked. “What’s that horrid smell?”

“The insecticide,” Harry replied, and said to Petunia, “I think you should stop spraying it; you’ve used too much.” As he spoke, another spider crawled out from the cupboard.

“Oh, my,” said Draco, coming to stand beside Harry, their shoulders brushing. He was still smirking. “Do all Muggle homes have such a problem with spiders?”

Vernon appeared in danger of seriously bursting a blood vessel in rage. He shouted, pointing first to Harry and then to Draco, “It’s you! You freaks! You — get out of my —“

“Let’s not be hasty,” Draco interrupted serenely. He walked to the cupboard, stepping carefully around the spiders struggling across the floor. “They seem to be coming from here.” He arched an eyebrow at the Dursleys. “Best to solve the problem at its origin. Do you agree?” And without giving them time to reply, he opened the cupboard door.

Even Harry, who had no particular fear of spiders (at least, not the common kind; Acromantulas were another story), had to admit that the scene which followed was kind of horrifying. What could only be described as an avalanche of spiders poured out; Draco only just managed to move out of the way, flicking a few of them off his shoes.

Petunia blanched a sickly white, and, apparently no longer even capable of screaming, rushed down the hall in the direction of the bathroom. There was the bang of a door, followed by the muffled sound of vomiting.

It took Vernon a few more seconds to react. He let out a roar of rage and swung his arm out, the blow headed straight for Harry.

“_Impedimenta_,” snapped Draco.

The spiders were spreading everywhere: down the hall, into the living room. They were on the walls and the stairs and the ceiling. Harry reached down and picked one off his jeans, holding it in the palm of his hand. Its legs tickled in just the way that he remembered.

Vernon lurched back into motion, nearly falling over. He gave a great yell and stomped on the wave of spiders by his feet, then unstrapped his belt and held it like a weapon, brandishing it at Draco. “You! You’ll pay for this.”

“Me?” said Draco innocently. “I didn’t do anything.” He twirled his wand in his hand. “I could, however, fix this, but sadly for you I’m not in the habit of doing favours for Muggles, especially when you can’t even ask me nicely.” He caught Harry’s eye. “In fact, I’m hungry. I think I’ll go have dinner.” As casual as you please, he strode into the dining room. His voice drifted back. “Oh, good. The table’s been set. Will you join me, Harry?”

“Sure,” Harry said, and put down the spider.

“Just wait one bloody moment —“ said Vernon, following them, snapping his belt.

“_Depulso_.” Vernon crashed back into the wall next to the cupboard door. Draco’s voice turned menacingly quiet. “I won’t say this again, Muggle: do not cross me any further.”

The table was set for two. Of course it was. Petunia’s plate had more vegetables in ratio to the roast lamb, so they redivided up the portions. A few spiders crawled onto the table. Harry brushed them away.

As they ate, they listened to the sounds of Vernon cursing and stomping.

“Pass the pepper, please,” said Draco pleasantly.

Harry handed him the shaker. Vernon’s stomps stopped. A few seconds later, they heard banging — Vernon had started pounding on the bathroom door, yelling for Petunia to come out.

Several more minutes passed. Vernon appeared at the entrance to the dining room, breathing hard, Petunia clutching on his arm and twitching. “We’re going out,” he announced wrathfully. He jabbed a finger in Harry’s direction. “When we get back, I want this place _spotless_. Do you hear me, boy? _Spotless_, or — or there’ll be hell to pay.”

“Okay,” Harry said, after a long pause. “Bye.”

Vernon sputtered, but didn’t seem capable of squeezing out a response. He stormed away, steering Petunia along with him. Harry could hear her whimpers, followed by the third door slam of the evening, and then the rumbling noise of the car engine starting up, and finally wheels screeching down the driveway.

At last, silence.

Draco put down his knife and fork, wiped his mouth. He said, “I hope you don’t expect me to find and Vanish one thousand spiders one by one, Potter.”

“You did it this morning, didn’t you,” Harry said, straight to the point. “What was it? The Gemino Curse?”

“Five points to Slytherin,” replied Draco. “The copies will break down on their own, don’t worry.”

“Oh, I’m not _worried_,” Harry assured him. “I’m beyond simple descriptions like ‘worried.’ What happened to acting like a proper guest?”

“Those are two separate matters.” Draco sipped at his glass of water. He was still in that ridiculous Hawaiian shirt. “Also, I hadn’t planned on _that_ many spiders. I thought maybe, oh, one hundred or so would do. So you see, my original intentions were perfectly reasonable.”

Harry put his face in his hands and started to laugh. He laughed so hard he began coughing, and then hiccuping, and Draco was obliged to come around the table and rub circles on his back.

“God,” Harry gasped, as he got his breath back. It was the laughter that was putting tears in his eyes, blurring his vision. “You complete lunatic.”

***

The Dursleys still hadn’t returned the next morning. Harry and Draco washed, dressed, and restored the bedroom to its prior state, shrinking the bed and placing Dudley’s old clothes back into the wardrobe neatly. The new Muggle clothes they packed in their trunks, which Draco had safely brought over the night before. The trunks were then shrunk and placed inside an old backpack of Harry’s, into which he also tucked the Invisibility Cloak, the drop of Felix Felicis, the box of Instant Peruvian Darkness Powder, and a couple of the Quicksand Caches (unfortunately, space was limited, as the backpack had no Extension Charm).

Without need for discussion, they’d reached the silent consensus that they would not be coming back.

Harry cooked breakfast again. This time, Draco spelled the dirty dishes clean.

The spiders had gone where spiders tended to go, into nooks and crannies and corners. Into cupboards. The only place that had not been breached was the bedroom they had slept in; Draco had drawn a line of runes across the threshold. Harry suspected that a good number had also found their way outside, to look for another house less crowded. It was unlikely any would have succeeded, though, since sometime throughout the night the spell had begun to wear off. The evidence was everywhere in the Dursley’s house: there were bits of dead spiders scattered all over the place. Harry suspected that Petunia would probably still be finding the remnants years later. He didn’t much care.

“All right,” he said to Draco. “Got everything? Let’s go.”

They picked up Mrs Figg at her house and walked together to the bus stop. Mrs Figg refused to be Side-Alonged, and in any case she was the only one familiar with their destination, so direct apparition wasn’t advisable anyway. They rode the bus to the train station, rode the train into London, then switched to the Tube.

“Merlin and Morgana,” remarked Draco as lights in the tunnels flashed past. “The Muggles really dug a bunch of holes underneath the city? Aren’t the roads enough for them?”

“Keep your voice down,” Harry warned, but no one was paying them any attention. It was peak hour, and every face in the press of bodies was angled politely to the ground, or at the windows. The man closest to Harry had a Walkman plugged into his ears. Draco kept staring at it curiously. To save him the trouble of asking, Harry leaned in and whispered, “It plays music.”

The morgue when they reached it was a blocky, modern building in slate grey and coffee brown. Apart from the sign, there was nothing about it that suggested it was a place where dead bodies were kept, at least to the layman, but Harry supposed that was only sensible. Mrs Figg spoke briefly to the receptionist, and before long a tall man with silver square rimmed glasses and frown lines on his forehead came to greet them. He was wearing a white lab coat on top of a black button-up, and when he smiled it was close-lipped and brief, but his manner with Mrs Figg was friendly enough.

“This is Lucas,” said Mrs Figg. “Lucas, this is Harry and Dale.”

“Hello,” said Lucas.

“Hello,” said Harry, shaking his hand. “Nice to meet you. Thanks for making time for us.”

“Hi,” said Draco, after a beat. “How do you do?”

“Nice to meet you, too,” Lucas said, then gestured. “This way, please.”

“_Dale_?” Draco hissed pointedly to Harry as they walked down the corridor. Harry suppressed laughter.

Lucas lead them into a rather depressing looking room with linoleum flooring and harsh overhead lighting. A series of cabinets lined one wall, stainless steel sinks and benchtops another. There were some metal trolleys on the far end, but only one was occupied. Thankfully, the cadaver was covered in plastic.

“Right, so,” Lucas said. He looked at Mrs Figg, then back at them. “You’re a bit younger than I’d thought, so perhaps this isn’t a good idea, but well — these are strange times.” He checked his watch. “John — I mean, Detective Farlow — should be here soon. You really did know the deceased?”

“Harry’s family friend,” Draco said smoothly. “Sort of like an uncle. He stayed at Harry’s house frequently. I knew him less well.”

“We were at a loss finding next of kin for him, to be sure,” said Lucas. “Of course, that’s not too unusual. It was his — grandfather, was it? — who came to sign his papers in the end.”

“I need to know how he died,” Harry said, unceremonious. “Mrs Figg said that you examined the body?”

“I did, yes,” replied Lucas. “I’m sorry to say your friend died from exsanguination, or, more colloquially, bleeding out. He lost over three litres of blood. There were multiple stab wounds, suggesting a struggle.” He suddenly stopped, wincing. “My apologies, boys. It’s — the job, you see. I’ll try to speak more tactfully.”

“Oh, no,” reassured Harry hurriedly. “That’s all right. Please speak freely. Multiple stab wounds?”

“There was one on his left shoulder. Shallow, not fatal,” elaborated Lucas. “Then two more in his abdomen, one of which was deep and sliced upward and diagonal, piercing his aorta. Other than that, there were some cuts across his palms that suggested he had tried to grab the knife, and scratching and bruising along his arm where he’d fallen on the ground.” He shook his head. “I’ll leave Detective Farlow to go over everything else with you at his discretion.”

Mrs Figg made small talk about her cats while they waited. Thankfully, it wasn’t long. Detective Farlow was a short man in his fifties or sixties with a neatly trimmed moustache and a faint wisp of hair on an otherwise balding head. He stood with a slope to his back that made him appear even shorter, and his shirt hung on his frame in a sad, dejected way, like it had been washed too many times and never ironed. He looked a little like a businessman Harry had once seen Uncle Vernon invite to dinner to bully into a contract and not at all like a detective, but his scrutiny when Lucas introduced them was uncomfortably intense and vaguely reminiscent of not-Moody.

“Students, are you?” he remarked, eyeing Harry up and down. “Lucas tells me you have some connection to the deceased, might be able to give me some information on the murder. You’re happy to give consent for this interview?”

“Er,” Harry said. He’d rather imagined that it would be the other way around.

“I beg your pardon, Detective,” Draco said quickly. “But Mundungus was a family friend of Harry’s, and he’s still quite shocked to learn of what happened. Might we speak more privately, at least to begin with?”

Harry did his best to look emotionally fragile.

Farlow looked at Lucas. Lucas raised one shoulder and said, “I can lend you my office.”

***

The office was tiny, cluttered with paperwork and empty mugs and, for some reason, potted cacti. Farlow drew the blinds down, took out a notepad and pen from his pockets, sat down in the swivel chair, and said, as Harry closed the door, “I’m very sorry for your loss, son. It’s been a rough few months for all of us. The first thing you should know —“

Draco got out his wand. He said quietly, “_Imperio_.”

Immediately, Farlow’s face fell slack. His pen fell onto the table and rolled until it hit the computer keyboard.

There was a long pause.

“We don’t have any Veritaserum,” Draco said, as if that explained everything. “If you’re going to have a moral breakdown, do it quickly.”

The way Farlow was staring vacantly into space was incredibly disturbing. Harry gave Draco a very loud speaking look and reached for Farlow’s notebook, opening it. He said, “Have him talk. Everything relevant about Mundungus’ death.”

“The body was discovered and reported on March 5th,” said Farlow lifelessly. He continued on to describe details they already knew, and added, “It was the first murder in a series of similar stabbings throughout South London that occurred during the months of March to May, five in total. There was no discernable pattern in the victims’ age, gender, ethnicity, appearance or background, save for the locale and the manner in which their bodies were stripped of all belongings, and of course the manner of death.”

“Here,” Harry said. He’d found the relevant notes, though they were difficult to decipher. There was a list of names and locations, and then another name with a phrase written underneath it in uppercase and circled many times over.

“‘Drowned in the Thames,’” Draco read. He shifted his focus back to Farlow. “Explain.”

“The killer was identified as a man named Sam Wilson, age thirty-four, allegedly self-employed as a business consultant,” Farlow droned. “He left a trail at the site of his final victim which lead directly to him. He jumped into the Thames in the middle of the night on the 17th of May, and his body was found further downstream on the northern bank six days later. There were multiple signs of self-inflicted injury, although Wilson did not have any psychiatric problems on record. There was nothing else found on his body. Acquaintances describe Wilson as a quiet man who kept to himself, was polite to his neighbours, and who sometimes fed stray dogs and cats. His flat was empty of all except bare necessities. There was no sign of what he had stolen off his victims, although one woman reported seeing Wilson visit a nearby pawn shop.”

Harry and Draco glanced at each other. Harry nodded.

Farlow said, “I investigated the pawn shop.” He stopped and made a strange noise, like something was stuck in his throat.

Draco was frowning. “Hang on.”

Farlow went on: “I investigated the, the, the. The pawn shop. There was no pawn shop. It was empty. It was empty. It was empty. Wilson. Wilson. More than once. No shop. Empty. Gone. No shop. Bodies, stabbed, multiple. No shop. Empty, empty empty empty.” He kept going, a string of disconnected words, until suddenly his voice hitched and Draco was snapping back his wand.

“We should go,” Harry said into the brittle silence. “Make a copy of his notebook.”

“Excuse me,” Farlow said, rubbing his face and sounding confused, “what’s happening? Was I saying something? I —“

“_Obliviate_,” Draco interrupted crisply. “Detective Farlow, we had a short but fruitless conversation. This was not the lead you hoped it would be. And now, you have just agreed kindly to give us the room for a moment.”

“Certainly, boys,” said Farlow with alacrity. “Well, I’m grateful that we could have this talk, and once again I’m sorry for your loss. You just let me know if you need anything.” And he left the room, leaving his notebook.

Draco made a copy of it and handed it to Harry. He said, voice light, hand tense, “Potter, you lazy prick. I can’t wait until you come of age.”

***

They thanked Mrs Figg for her help and dropped her off at the station, insisting that they would be all right and did not need to return to the Dursley’s. She parted with them reluctantly, under the false impression that the meeting with Farlow had been less than satisfactory. Unfortunately for her, it was probably better that she remained ignorant. Harry wondered if this was how Dumbledore had felt all the time. But Mrs Figg was a Squib — what would be the point of putting her in more danger?

They found a small café, dimly lit. Draco ordered for them both at the counter, solving the issue of his unfamiliarity with the money by overpaying with three fifty-pound notes. Harry left him to it and found a table at the back. He wanted to sit with a wall behind him; Farlow’s broken sentences had filled him with paranoia.

“We weren’t the first ones to speak to Farlow,” he said once Draco joined him.

“Someone’s Obliviated his memory regarding the pawn shop,” Draco agreed.

“If it was Death Eaters, then we’re on the right trail.”

“Chances that it’s a coincidence, and it was the French instead?”

A waitress came with their order. She placed a cup of coffee in front of Harry, a strawberry smoothie in front of Draco, and then began to set down what appeared to be the entire selection of cakes and pastries that the café offered. She smiled at them warmly when she was done, and said, no hint of judgement whatsoever, “Enjoy.”

“Enjoy,” Harry repeated disbelievingly. “Malfoy, what.”

“Do not discourage my efforts to understand Muggle culture, Potter,” Draco admonished. “Oh, this is actually edible. Do you want some?”

“Wizards have cakes, you know.”

“Do we? I hadn’t really noticed. Hey, try this.”

Harry steadied Draco’s hand on the fork and took the bite, eyeing over Draco’s shoulder the beginnings of the lunch break rush hour. “Hm,” he said neutrally. “Tastes like cake.”

Draco sniffed, and ate the rest of the slice. Harry drank his coffee.

After a while, Draco said, “A Death Eater would have likely just killed Farlow, so it could have been the French.”

“Unless the Death Eater was under instructions to not draw attention to whatever they were doing,” Harry countered. He tapped the copy of the notebook. “We have the address of the pawn shop. We’ll have a better idea soon enough. Are you going to eat _all_ of this?”

“No, you should have some, too,” Draco said. “Energy, Potter. If you collapse on me in the middle of a thrilling Death Eater chase because we had an early breakfast and you ran out of steam I will not be pleased.”

Picking up his own fork and choosing a plate at random, Harry scoffed, “And if you crash hard from a sugar high later, remind me to say ‘I told you so.’”

***

The pawnbrokers shop was easy to spot, covered as it was with garish yellow and black signs reading ‘WE TRADE GOLD FOR CASH.’ They approached cautiously, but it was just a normal Muggle street: no one stopped them, no spell was shouted from across the street. If anything, that made it worse.

When they were a few paces away it became clear that the shop was closed. The interior was dark, and the window displays were mostly empty. What remained was in disarray, a few necklaces and rings scattered on the shelves. Harry leaned against the glass, squinting.

“Doesn’t look like anyone’s inside,” he said. “Can you —“

“Come on,” Draco said, already opening the door, tucking his wand away. A welcome bell tinkled.

The displays in the inside of the shop were in much the same state as the ones by the front windows. Nothing was broken, but some stands were at odd angles, or had tipped over. A clock ticked on the wall.

“There are runes here,” Draco said, pointing at the floor. “Standard anchor to repel Muggle interest, another for an Anti-Apparition Jinx. You’d have to apparate onto the street.”

“That confirms it, then,” replied Harry, voice low. “Death Eaters.” He could see no reason why French Obliviators would ward off a pawn shop.

“There’s a door over here to the back of the shop,” Draco said. “I can’t see the locket anywhere, can you?”

“No.” Harry went behind the counter. The drawers underneath, full of paper records, had been rifled through. A cheap paperback novel with a front cover illustration of a galloping horse sat in one, its corners worn.

“What’s this?” Draco asked, coming to stand on the other side. “There was one at the morgue, too. It looks like the other thing, the television, but smaller.”

“A computer machine,” Harry told him. “It’s like a box of information. And programs.”

“Programs?”

Harry stared at the monitor. His reflection stared back. “I don’t know, honestly. I’ve never really used one before. Dudley has one; he plays video games on it. They’re expensive.”

“If it’s a box of information, would it know where the locket is?”

Harry, thinking the same thing, investigated. But no matter what he did, which buttons he pressed, the monitor remained a dark mirror.

“Maybe it’s broken,” he said. “Or it’s not getting power. None of the lights in here work, either. Hang on, let me see if it’s plugged in.” He ducked down, but couldn’t find anything amiss with the power cord. When he re-emerged, Draco was tapping the top of monitor with his wand.

“Can’t we just open the box, and take out the information?” he asked, brow furrowed.

“Er, no,” said Harry, biting away a smile. “I’m pretty sure it doesn’t work like that. Listen, they have paper records here, so I think we should —“

_Clack_.

As one, they turned towards the door at the back, which Harry was only now realising they should have checked first. He locked eyes with Draco, then took out the Invisibility Cloak. They edged around the displays until they were closer to the door but not in its direct line of sight. Miming a countdown, Harry kicked over a cabinet, swinging the Cloak around them as the sound of breaking glass filled the room.

They waited, crouched.

Whoever it was on the other side took their time. Harry strained his ears, but could discern no hint of movement: not footsteps, not voices. Beside him, Draco’s breathing was shallow, like his own. _Tick_, said the clock on the wall. _Bump_, said his heart in his throat.

The doorknob turned. The door opened.

The tip of a wand came through first, and then a shaking hand, and finally a face Harry recognised.

It was Theo.


	24. Chapter 24

Theo had always been quick to know incantations but slow to fire spells. He was easy to disarm, and then he was at their mercy.

Harry gave him his wand back.

“Harry,” Theo said. His cheekbones stood out; he’d lost weight. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“We don’t intend to stay,” Harry informed him, walking into the back room. A bunch of shelves and cabinets for storage had been pushed aside, some shrunken smaller, to make space for a conjured cot, a desk, a chair, and a stack of wizarding books. From the state of the cot and Theo’s bedhair, he’d been asleep. The room had no windows; a number of floating candles were the only light source.

“You’re looking for Slytherin’s locket, aren’t you?” Theo asked. “It’s not here.”

Draco stood in front of the doorway. He was watching Theo in a way that was not entirely friendly. He said, “You knew about what happened to Mother, earlier this year. You knew about Rosier. And now you’re here.”

“Rosier?” Theo repeated.

“You helped us,” Harry reminded him.

“He’s a Death Eater,” Draco snapped.

Deliberately, Theo placed his wand down on the table. He held both arms up, hands empty. “I couldn’t leave Father to face it alone. I’m not like you, Draco.”

Draco’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “The Dark Lord will be defeated, Nott. You will regret this.”

“I’m not so sure I will,” Theo said, and instead of sounding triumphant or defensive he just sounded tired. “You’ve seen the Dark Lord, haven’t you? Did he seem weak?”

“He seemed like a deranged maniac eager to destroy everything,” Draco said scathingly.

“And you care about ‘everything,’ since when?”

A muscle twitched on Draco’s cheek. “I never said I did. But Harry does.”

A joyless smile flickered across Theo’s face. “It’s not everything, anyway,” he said thinly. “Better them than us.”

“Why warn us about Rosier, then?” Harry wanted to know. “Why bother?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Theo clenched his jaw.

Harry stepped closer. “Where’s the locket, Theo?”

“Not here. I don’t know where.”

“You helped us before,” Harry said. “Help us now. The Death Eaters haven’t found the locket either, have they? Had it already been bought by the time you got here? Was there a record of the purchase?” He took Theo by the shoulders. “Theo, tell me.”

“I don’t know where it is.”

“Yes, but was there a record? A trail? Why are you here, if not to look for it, same as us? Tell us what you know.”

Theo closed his eyes. “I don’t know where it is.”

“Something’s not right,” Draco said. “We should search this room.”

They searched it from top to bottom, overturning the boxes and scattering the contents — files, broken items, jewellery, equipment — all over the floor. There was no Slytherin locket. The wizarding books were of the sort that Theo had always enjoyed reading, back during Hogwarts.

“I don’t know where it is,” Theo whispered as they worked. “I don’t know, I don’t know.”

“Harry,” said Draco, tone suggesting he’d thought of something. “We should tr—“

The crack of apparition sliced through the air. It sounded like it had come from the rooftop.

“Fuck,” Harry said under his breath.

Colour drained completely from Theo’s face. He stared at them despairingly.

“Quick,” Harry said, throwing the Invisibility Cloak and the backpack to Draco. “Take Theo. I’ll follow.”

“Follow? Don’t be stupid —“

The shop’s welcome bell tinkled.

“Theodore, my dear,” sang Bellatrix’s voice from the shopfront. “Are you home?”

Draco disappeared under the Cloak.

Harry ran out of the door, ducking low. “_Crucio_,” he yelled. With his other arm, he threw.

The Unforgivable hit, but it didn’t hold. Bellatrix screamed, the tenor of it all wrong, full of pleasure instead of pain.

“Oh,” she gushed, a moment later. “Little baby’s here, how lucky, how wonderful.”

A rope the colour of a deep purple bruise shot towards him, twisting like an eel. He leapt wildly toward the left to avoid it, crashing into a display cabinet. Glass dug into his skin. He bit back a cry and got back up. He couldn’t stay still.

Another curse hit where he had been just a moment ago. He twisted and thought, _Sectumsempra_, and the edge of it caught Bellatrix’s shoulder. Behind her, the clock fell, cut in half. Blood sprayed on the wall. She laughed.

Just a little further. He wound around towards her right, casting more hexes. She was playing with him. As long as she was playing, then he could —

He tripped over a fallen shelf.

“_Crucio_,” said Bellatrix.

This, again — he’d lived through it before and he’d, he’d survive it once more — but how had he forgotten, how had he misremembered how much it hurt? One hundred thousand billion trillion needles through his skin, through his eyes, in his throat, and every needle had a mouth with teeth, dripping with a venom that burned, and they were biting, biting, eating away at every cell in his body —

Bellatrix laughed and laughed, and then suddenly she stopped.

Harry panted, retching, water in his eyes, from where he didn’t know, until he realised he’d been crying, but he was fine, it was fine, he just needed to get up, move one arm, move the other arm, crawl if he had to …

Bellatrix had sunk into the Quicksand Cache he had thrown directly into her path. She’d been focused on him, and the Cruciatus, and the shop interior was dark compared to the street: she hadn’t seen, it had worked.

He staggered forward, away from another curse, on his knees, and then on his elbows again, glass from somewhere falling into his hair. The door was so close. If he could just get to it, could just open it —

Where was Draco?

If the door was still closed, then Draco hadn’t opened it, which meant Draco hadn’t gone, which meant —

Something invisible grabbed his shoulder, and behind him Bellatrix screamed, sounding far less pleased this time. Harry turned to look; her eyes were shut, and there was blood pouring from every orifice on her face.

Draco, still invisible, dragged him out onto the street. With a twist, they apparated.

***

Waves, crashing against a cliffside. Harry blinked at the sunlight, then blinked again; something was trying to stick his eyelids together.

“Just a bit further, Potter,” Draco said brusquely, half in and half out of the Cloak, one arm visible, his left ear missing. He pushed open the door to Ursa-at-Sea, grunting, and heaved Harry inside. He dumped the backpack on the floor and threw off the Cloak.

Harry allowed himself to be manoeuvred onto a soft surface. The sitting room couch.

“Where’s Theo?” he asked.

“I left him there, obviously,” Draco replied. “I’m going to take off your clothes.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re covered head to toe in glass, you imbecile. No, don’t move.” Making a _tsk_ing sound, Draco cut open Harry’s shirt with a spell.

“I mean why did you leave Theo there,” Harry said, grimacing as the shirt was pealed off.

“Trousers and pants, too,” Draco commanded. Harry stretched out his legs, fighting the pain in his knees. Draco cut the fabric along the seams, pealed it all off. He said, voice perfectly steady, which meant that he was angry, “This is not how I usually imagine undressing you.”

“Stop talking nonsense, Malfoy. You should have brought Theo.”

“No I should not have,” Draco retaliated hotly. “He’s a Death Eater, and he’ll be fine. Besides, what do you think would happen to his father if he fled to join this side, at this stage? Nott’s made his choice. It’s not ours to unmake.”

“It’s not about sentiment,” Harry said.

“Can you stand up?” Draco asked, ignoring him. “I need to pull out the glass before I can heal this.”

Harry staggered up and stood in silence as Draco plucked out the shards. He realised that Draco’s hands were covered in blood, and that the blood was probably his, Harry’s. That must have been what was gluing his eyelids closed, as well. But it was Bellatrix who Draco had hit with the nonverbal blood curse.

“What was that?” Draco said.

“You hit Bellatrix with a blood curse,” Harry repeated.

“Yeah.”

“Bellatrix, not me. Why am I covered in so much blood?”

“Because you’re an idiot.” Draco stepped back and looked him over. “You crawled across floor that was covered in broken glass, practically rolled around in it, and more of it fell on you. You didn’t notice?”

“I thought it was just a little.”

“You were also under Cruciatus for several minutes, so —“ Draco’s mouth twisted. “Harry, stay here. I’m going to run a bath and brew a potion for you to soak in. It’ll loosen your skin and get out the rest of the shards that are too small for me to take out by hand. Are you listening? Sit. Don’t move.”

Harry sat and didn’t move. Draco had taken his glasses off at some point. He felt lightheaded, dazed. Was it the light falling across his knees that was warm, or was it that his nerves were burning? Was he still under Cruciatus, or just the memory of it? He was exhausted, he wanted to sleep …

“Hey,” said Draco’s voice. “Get up, come on. I’d levitate you, but you know how difficult it is to angle things properly around corners in tight spaces. It’s not far. Shh, Harry. Come on.”

One second later — was it just one second later? — he was being lowered into water. It burned. He cried out, then swallowed it down.

“Shh,” Draco said, his voice no longer steady, which meant that he was no longer angry. “It’ll — it’ll sting, I know, just bear it. Float on your back. If you can, hold your breath and go under for a while; there’s glass on your face, as well.”

Harry groaned, then did as he was told. When he resurfaced, the glue had cleared from his eyes. Light reflecting off the water danced across the ceiling. Steam swirled. The bath at Ursa-at-Sea was styled in the way of the prefect baths at Hogwarts, which was to say it was more like a pool than a tub. It was a smooth indentation carved into the floor, as though the stone were butter that had been scooped out by a giant spoon. Draco sat now at its shore, watching him.

“Are you all right?” Harry asked softly.

“It’s just glass,” Draco said, not answering. “Not even from a curse. It’ll heal easily. I put in some drops of dittany, as well.”

Harry tried to raise his head higher.

“Don’t,” warned Draco. “I want you to soak for an hour. You don’t need to look me over, Potter. I didn’t get hit with anything, because as you’ll recall I was invisible. I’m fine.”

Harry regarded him for a while longer, then closed his eyes, submerging his head again. When he came back up, he said, “Theo?”

“I Stunned him,” Draco said. “He wasn’t going to cooperate. There was no way he would have stayed under the Cloak.”

“He’s not our enemy.”

“Isn’t he?” Draco said flippantly, but immediately continued: “Of course he isn’t. It doesn’t matter.” He made as though to touch Harry’s cheek, but didn’t quite make contact. Instead, he said, “I’m going to go clean up. I’ll come get you when the hour’s passed. Try not to accidentally drown yourself until then.”

***

When Harry woke up the next morning, his skin was tingling all over. It felt — like it was new, which might not have been too far from the truth.

“You’re awake,” said Draco. He was sitting in an armchair a few paces from the bed, reading _Archer and the Tree of Before_. “Hungry?”

“Starving,” Harry said, yawning.

Draco turned a page. “Well you can go get your own food, because I’m not your house-elf.”

Amused, Harry went to get dressed and discovered that Draco had unpacked their clothing into the same wardrobe. He threw on a clean shirt and jeans and left for the kitchen, where he found a massive pot of stew. He helped himself to a bowl and brought it back to the bedroom. “Are you trying to feed an army?”

“No, just one brute,” came the dry reply.

“It tastes good. What was in that potion you put in the bath?”

“Stuff.”

“Draco. What stuff?”

“Dried and crushed fluxweed boiled in distilled honeywater, balanced with sal ammoniac dissolved with twenty-one grams of phoenix eggshell powder. Stirred in a ratio of four to five until clear in a fine silver cauldron, bottom half an inch thick. Four drops of dittany. That was added separately to the bath and mixed with a spell.”

“You came up with it?”

“With what I had on hand, yes.” Draco looked up from the book. “Ideally, I would have liked to double steam the fluxweed and honeywater, but there wasn’t enough time. It wasn’t anything complicated. To be honest, I think it was mostly the dittany.”

“Only four drops?”

“The cuts weren’t magical injuries. The potion was intended to enhance the efficacy of the drops, anyway. It seems like it worked.”

It had more than worked; Harry hadn’t just healed — he felt rejuvenated. Even the pain in his joints from the Cruciatus was much fainter than he had any right to expect it to be. Grinning, he said, “Thanks.”

Draco smiled and turned his attention back to the book. “Eat your food, Potter.”

Harry ate slowly, then went to check on the state of the house when he finished. The pantry was not at all depleted from when they had stocked it last in preparation, which indicated that Narcissa was likely staying elsewhere. Draco had spelled away most of the blood Harry had dripped across the floor and on the couch, but missed some spots. Judging magic safe to use under Fidelius, Harry cleaned those up himself.

Walburga’s portrait was empty. The day outside was clear. The world didn’t look like it was on the verge of breaking whatsoever. Not today, not tomorrow.

Draco was still reading when Harry returned: legs folded up in the armchair, a hand under his chin. He was dressed loosely in a set of white robes with gold embroidery that didn’t really suit him, because it highlighted the lack of colour in his grey eyes and pale complexion. Only the slant of the sun, hitting the rich wooden floorboards and rebounding back in an orange glow, saved the picture. Where Draco should have looked like a ghost he looked like something else instead, something Harry wanted, and then the wind blew forth the curtains, shifting the light, and Harry blinked and let it go.

He said, “I read that book, you know.”

Draco made a noncommital noise.

“What’s so interesting about it? How many times have you read it by now?”

There was no response for several moments. Then, reluctantly, Draco tucked his bookmark between the pages and said, “Mother recommended it to me.”

“Yeah, I remember you saying so.”

Draco put the book down, leaned more heavily on his elbow. “So you read it? Did Archer save the village?”

“What d’you mean? That’s the story, isn’t it?”

“The story changes depending on who reads it,” Draco explained. “There are a lot of novels with the same gimmick, obviously, but _Archer and the Tree of Before_ is a classic, and still to this date one of the most complex.”

“Oh,” Harry said. “So you’re … reading it to study the enchantment?”

“It’s a powerful bit of magic.” Draco stretched. “Anyway, I want to talk to you about Theo, now that you’re feeling better.”

Harry eyed the book a moment longer. He said, “I told you: I didn’t want him brought along for sentiment. He knows something. Without him, we have no leads on the locket.”

“_You_ might have no leads,” Draco drawled, getting up. He walked out towards the sitting room; Harry followed. “But I, unlike you, am a genius.” He unzipped the backpack and took something out, holding up his hand. “You can praise me now, Potter.”

By all appearances, Draco’s hand was empty. “Er,” Harry said. “I can’t see anything.”

“That’s because it’s a Mokeskin pouch,” Draco informed him smugly. “We’d searched the room but not Theo himself. So I Stunned him, and found this in his robes just before it contracted and turned invisible.”

Harry took the invisible pouch, feeling at it blindly. It was about the size of his palm, maybe slightly smaller, and wasn’t particularly heavy, but that didn’t mean much when it came to magical storage devices. “You think the locket’s in here?”

“I’ve no idea,” Draco replied. “Only the owner of a Mokeskin pouch can remove whatever it is they put in.”

“Then how do we get access?”

“What would you do without me and my genius, Potter?” Draco said, still smug. “Where would you be without my quick wit? My unparalleled, soaring intellect? Hm? What’s that? You’re eternally grateful for my aid, and you acknowledge my superiority henceforth, forevermore? Hm?”

“So I was wondering why you were being so humble about the potion from yesterday,” Harry said, knocking against his shoulder. “I should’ve known it was because you were saving yourself for something else. Yes, Draco, you’re smart and wonderful and brilliant, et cetera, please tell me now about how you’ve solved everything.”

“Well, not everything,” Draco conceded. He led Harry down to the room beside the pantry, which he had requisitioned for potions making. On the table there was a vial of opaque blue-green liquid.

“Ah,” Harry said, the pieces sliding together. “Polyjuice?”

“Mother told me she left the last of the stock she managed to buy here, for me,” Draco said. “I grabbed some of Nott’s hair as soon as I realised it was a Mokeskin pouch.”

“Will it work?”

“Won’t know until we try. But I think it will; the magic of a Mokeskin pouch is built directly on the characteristics of the moke it was made from, and mokes are animals that react to and rely on appearances. They make distinctions based on magic, so they will shrink in the presence of Muggles, for instance, but they don’t know how to distinguish between unique magical signatures. Which is to say their memory is built upon the base five senses. Sight and touch, primarily.”

“Okay, Professor Malfoy, genius extraordinaire. Who’s drinking down essence of Theodore Nott, then?”

“Not me,” Draco said immediately. “I’m the brains portion of this operation, Potter. You can be the brawn. Or in this case, you can be Nott.”

“Ugh,” Harry said. “Fine.”

Draco uncorked the vial. “Best to down it in one.”

Years ago, when Dudley had been put on a diet and Aunt Petunia had consigned them all to the same fate of carrots and greens, she had at one point made what she called a ‘breakfast drink’ that was a blend of celery sticks, broccoli, garlic, and Harry didn’t know what else. When Dudley had thrown a fit about it, Uncle Vernon had made Harry drink all of it instead. The taste of Theo’s Polyjuice was oddly similar, except it was probably far less healthy.

“Ugh,” Harry said again, more forcefully, as his body changed. It was deeply disturbing to feel his bones move of their own accord. Halfway through, he reached down urgently to take off his shoes; Theo’s feet were at least two sizes bigger.

Draco watched him transform with a fascinated expression, then said, when it was done, “So that’s what Nott would look like if he went around all day thinking about heroics and Quidditch instead of the etymology of same-category spells divided by continent.” He took off Harry’s glasses, put them on the table.

Harry rolled Nott’s eyes and held up the Mokeskin pouch, which was, slowly but surely, growing in size and becoming less invisible by the second.

“Let’s hope there’s something worthwhile in here,” he said.

***

There were only two things in the pouch.

The first was a letter to Theo from his father. It read:

_Son,_

_I regret little of my life, save that you did not have the opportunity to know your mother. If you had, you would not be suffering now. I am sure of it. She would have instilled within you the conviction you need. She tried to. She ran out of time._

_You are too full of questions; the world too lacking in answers. This is true. But in this matter you already know what I think, what I have decided. That you are still asking the question means only that you refuse to accept the answer._

_Better them than us. And better me than you._

The second item was a glass tube filled with a misty silvery substance, not quite liquid, not quite gas, which Harry recognised at once.

They had to go back to Hogwarts.

***

They went like thieves in the night, wary of being seen, Draco Disillusioned and Harry under the Cloak. Once they were at the gates, Harry sent his Patronus to fetch McGonagall to be let in. This close to Hogwarts, the Trace didn’t matter. He still felt rather ridiculous sending the summons, nevertheless. A student, summoning the Headmistress? _Detention!_ wailed a voice in his head.

But he wasn’t a student, not anymore, not right then.

Unfortunately, McGonagall did not come down herself, and instead saw fit to send Snape.

“Potter,” drawled Snape in his oily manner as soon as Harry took off the Cloak. “I must admit this is a faster retreat than even I was anticipating. What proved to be too much? Surely even you can survive for longer than one week without the simpering adoration of your heavily misguided fans.”

“Thanks for the expression of confidence, sir, but I don’t have time for this,” Harry told him briskly. “We need to use the Hogwarts Pensieve.”

“Hello, sir,” added Draco pleasantly.

“Mr Malfoy,” said Snape. “As ever, your choice of companionship is a terrible mystery to me. Well, Potter, what are you waiting for?”

Outwardly, Hogwarts had not changed much, except for the addition of guards. There were guards stationed at all the entrances — including the hidden ones, according to Snape, who seemed disappointed that Harry had not sneaked in via one of the tunnels to be caught by the traps waiting therein — and teams of patrols working in shifts across the grounds, and on broomsticks in the air. Inside, it was a different matter entirely. The corridors were wider, the classrooms larger, the stairs more numerous and confusing than ever (luckily, the suits of armour now appeared to be giving directions). All that, however, Harry had expected. What he had not was the way Hogwarts had exploded with colour. No one was in the standard black school uniform. Instead, there was dress of all cuts and styles, Muggle attire and wizarding robes, and a strange mix of the two. Signs floated in the air in front of doorways. The one in front of the Great Hall flashed ‘DINNER CONCLUDED, BREAKFAST 6 TO 9 ONLY, NO LATE SERVINGS’. Another in front of what used to be the first-floor Muggle Studies classroom read ‘MUGGLE RELATIONS LIAISON, OWLS TO ROYAL MAIL AND TELEPHONE, _NO_ DIAL-UP INTERNET, OPEN 10 TO 8, 7 DAYS A WEEK’. Curiously, only the hourglasses which kept track of House points were still in the old spot, undisturbed, and still seemed to be keeping tally.

It was chaotic, a small city crowded indoors. Harry didn’t know whether to be glad that Hermione’s plan seemed to be working well, or to feel displaced from his own home.

They followed Snape to McGonagall’s office in silence, Cloaked and Disillusioned. The gargoyle, when they reached it, looked the same as always, which was a relief.

The office proper, of course, was different again, but not drastically. McGonagall had removed all but one of Dumbledore’s silver instruments, and it now sat alone in a different location. She’d transfigured some of the furniture: less padding, more fine detail. A wall scroll with a strange rotating drawing of concentric circles marked with Celtic runes hung on the side of the wall by the door, and the space where Fawkes’ perch had sat was now empty. Overall, it felt more austere, but Harry also felt more comfortable.

There was a portrait of Dumbledore, sitting with the others. The figure inside it was sleeping. Harry looked at it warily as he folded up his Cloak, then decided to ignore it.

“Thank you for letting us in, Professor,” he said to McGonagall, who was seated behind the desk. “We need use of the Hogwarts Pensieve, and intend to leave as soon as we’ve viewed the memory. No one else needs to know we’ve been here.”

She regarded him silently for several seconds before replying, “I’m aware that Albus Dumbledore entrusted you with a mission, Mr Potter. Beyond giving you use of the Pensieve, is there any way in which I can help you?”

Harry hesitated. “I — I don’t know, Professor. Yet.”

The weight of her gaze was almost tangible. “I assume that you would like to view the memory in private?”

“Er. Yes, please.”

She stood up, but instead of leaving, told them, “The Order has had word that Bellatrix Lestrange was injured.”

“We ran into her yesterday,” Draco said.

McGonagall looked worried. “The report came from your mother, Mr Malfoy.”

Draco’s face lit up. “Is she here?”

“She was, earlier today. Not currently. If you would like to leave word, I can pass it along.”

“No,” Draco said. “That won’t be necessary.”

McGonagall inclined her head. “Then I will give the two of you the room. When you need to leave, inform either me or Professor Snape so that you may be escorted out safely beyond the wards. And Mr Potter: do not forget my offer of help.”

Snape didn’t follow her out immediately. He lingered, inscrutable, staring directly at Harry.

“What?” Harry asked rudely.

“The most difficult part is still far ahead, Potter,” Snape said finally, sneering. “You have yet to prove anything.” He opened the door and left.

“As if I don’t know killing Voldemort is going to be the worst of it,” Harry muttered.

“He just doesn’t like your face,” Draco said, patting him on the back. “Don’t take it personally.”

Harry snorted and went over to the cupboard where Dumbledore used to keep the Pensieve. Thankfully, McGonagall hadn’t moved it. “Help me carry this.”

They set it carefully on the floor, and sat down cross-legged on opposite sides. Draco got out the glass tube and poured in Theo’s memory. “Ready?” he asked.

“Together, on the count of three,” Harry said. “One, two, three.”

***

They landed in a grand hallway that Harry did not recognise. The floor was black marble shot through with skeins of white. To his left was a giant window that ran the entire length of the hallway end to end, the glass so clear that Harry would not have known it was a window at all except that it was decorated with an ornate grille across the top and bottom. Beyond the window was a view of a garden: rows upon rows of flowers, some of them visibly magical, not one petal out of place, and at the centre of them was a single tree with grey bark, bare of any leaves. It was a sunny day.

To his right were two doors, spaced far apart, with a life-size portrait of a woman in between them. She was sitting on a swing attached to a tree; it looked like the same tree in the garden, except in the painting it was blooming with yellow flowers.

Theo was standing by the portrait, arms across his chest, staring out at the view.

“This is Swallow’s Rest,” Draco murmured beside Harry. “The ancestral home of the Nott family.”

Theo said, “Yes.”

Harry started, but of course Theo could not hear them; he was speaking to the portrait.

Theo continued, “He meant to hide this by sending Rosier, sending me. Or — no, maybe I’m wrong. Mother, I could be wrong. I wish I was wrong. But it’s dangerous to even think it in his presence. I don’t know Occlumency … Mother, what should I do?”

The woman in the portrait, Theo’s mother, replied, “Sweetling, darling, there is nothing to do, nothing to be done. It’s raining.” She giggled.

“I wish you could help me,” Theo went on. “Father — he was tricked by Narcissa Malfoy. He’s not in a good state. I dare not — if I don’t do this right, Mother …”

“Yesterday we flew up the hill and saw the spire,” said Mrs Nott. “It was raining, raining …”

“It’s a broken portrait,” Draco whispered, sounding horrified.

“Raining!” cried Mrs Nott. “Aristides promised me.”

“How does a portrait break?” Harry asked.

“They shouldn’t,” Draco answered. “Theoretically it’s possible, if the craftsmanship was poor — but getting your portrait taken is like buying a wand. No one unless desperate would commission anyone other than a master.”

Theo was still pleading: “Can I tell you, Mother? Will you help me? Please, I wish you could help me …”

“So,” Harry said, uncertain, “this was painted by an amateur?”

“No, I don’t think so,” said Draco slowly. He walked closer to the portrait, to Theo, who had slid down the wall to sit on the floor. “Nott never talked about it; he talked about everything except painting — I thought it was just because he wasn’t interested in it, and didn’t want the pressure. Theo’s father is a master painter, as was his grandfather; the Nott family built its fortune on art. This portrait of Mrs Nott was very likely painted by him.”

“I wish,” said Theo. “I wish …”

“What do you wish, sweetling?” singsonged Mrs Nott. Her laughter echoed down the hallway. “Have you slept? Have you eaten? Oh, to look upon the spire. Oh, to once more see the sun.”

“Why is it broken?” Draco wondered, examining the canvas, but as he did so the memory blurred, disintegrated, and became another.

A forest grew around them. Shadows from the trees bled like ink across the ground. A wind blew; the foliage overhead rustled. A bird trilled.

Next to them, Theo threw a plain wooden box into a hole in the ground.

Draco spun in a circle, taking in the scene. “Do you know where this might be?”

Harry shook his head.

Theo raised his wand and redirected a pile of dirt back into the hole, filling it up. Another spell coaxed blades of grass to grow across the bare soil. Then he kicked across some dead leaves and fallen sticks. Finished, he retreated a few steps and considered the ground where the box was buried critically, wiping his arm across his forehead. There was a sickly quality to his appearance.

The memory dissolved. A wave of darkness washed over the trees; they disappeared.

They were standing high over water, several metres above the undulating surface. Caught by vertigo, expecting instinctively to drop and sink, Harry nearly lost his footing. Draco grabbed him by the elbow.

Righting himself, Harry noted the pattern of lights in the far distance. It allowed for an educated guess regarding their location: somewhere along the Thames. Night time. The bone-deep rumble of an aeroplane sounded overhead. The airport was behind them.

Below, Theo surfaced, gasping. He swam to the shore and dried himself with a spell, before jerking his wand at the river. A few moments passed, then, with a splash, a body flew out as if reeled in by a fishing line. The body wasn’t moving, didn’t look like it was breathing. Theo took it by its shirt and turned it onto its back; he knelt down beside it and began to fumble with something on its neck.

Harry and Draco drifted down. Theo hadn’t cast _Lumos_; it was too dark to see clearly.

Still, it was obvious. “This is the Muggle,” Harry said. “Wilson. The one who killed Mundungus.”

Theo got back up, breathing hard. He waved his wand at Wilson’s corpse and sent it back into the water. The thing that had been around Wilson’s neck was now in his hand.

Slytherin’s locket.


	25. Chapter 25

They watched the memories several more times, until Harry was certain they had not missed any vital details.

“It’s a different order each time,” he said, scrubbing at his eyes and fighting back a yawn.

Draco grunted, looking equally tired. “Pensieves are tools designed to sort memories, but they won’t function without direction.”

“Stop sounding smart, Malfoy,” Harry complained. “I knew all that. I just meant — what d’you think is the correct order?”

“He finds the locket, he speaks to the portrait, he buries it,” said Draco without hesitation.

“Yeah,” Harry agreed after a pause. “I think so, too.” With effort, he pushed himself off the floor and offered Draco an arm. They sat down together on a couch by the fireplace. “So we just need to find where he buried it.”

“Oh, yes,” said Draco, dour. “Somewhere in some forest. Easy.”

Harry brought his legs up and announced, “I want to lie down.” Draco raised his eyebrows, but moved over without comment. Harry Summoned a cushion and put it on Draco’s lap, then put his head on the cushion. Settled, he said, “Let’s go over events.”

“Mundungus Fletcher steals the locket,” Draco said, leaning his head back and speaking to the ceiling.

“He’s killed in a Muggle alleyway,” Harry continued. “The locket is stolen. We can assume it was stolen by the murderer, a Muggle named Wilson, who goes on to kill five more people. He’s nearly caught after the last, but before he is, he jumps into the Thames. Theo finds the body and takes the locket.”

“In second year,” said Draco thoughtfully, “Ginevra Weasley was possessed, correct?”

“By Tom Riddle’s diary, yeah.”

“Which was a Horcrux.”

“Riddle said that as she wrote in the diary she fed him bits of herself, and he was able to replace those with his own personality.”

“So if one Horcrux could possess people who came into contact with it, can the others?”

Harry considered. “I don’t know. You can write in a diary; I don’t see how you can do the same with a locket.”

“It has a fragment of the Dark Lord’s soul. That doesn’t sound like the sort of thing I would trust to _not_ possess its owner.”

“Why does it matter?”

“Mundungus Fletcher goes drinking in several Muggle pubs,” Draco recounted. “Loses his wand somehow. Is attacked. Barely fights back. His magic gives up on him and allows him to die. The murderer, apparently motivated by money, does not pawn off the locket, and instead kills five more people.”

“Okay,” Harry allowed. “Let’s assume then that the locket has some way of exerting its influence. Voldemort —“ Draco twitched — “_Voldemort_ sends Theo to find the locket, without telling him of its importance, like how he sent Rosier after the diadem. And Theo — Theo finds it.” Harry frowned. “He finds it, and then he goes to the pawn shop?”

“He doesn’t,” Draco disputed. “Nott must have seen something, or heard something. He warned us about Rosier; he already knew the Dark Lord was looking for certain items. And you know how Nott is. The more obscure the knowledge, the more he was interested. He worked out the locket was a Horcrux.”

“So he panics and buries it,” Harry said despondently.

“Think about it from Nott’s perspective.” Draco tapped a finger on Harry’s temple lightly. “He has to support his father. He doesn’t know Occlumency. If he hands over the Horcrux to the Dark Lord with the knowledge of what it is floating in his head, it’s over. If he hands over the Horcrux to the resistance and is found out, which he would be, he dooms his father. He knows there’s likely more than one. He thinks it’s hopeless. He —“

“He meant it,” Harry interrupted, suddenly wide awake. “He meant it when he said — when we found him — he said that he didn’t know where it was. He hid it and he took out those three memories and then he Obliviated himself. About everything to do with Horcruxes. And then he — he keeps searching, because he doesn’t know he’s already found it. So he … he ends up on the same trail we did, since Wilson is dead. Maybe he was the one who Obliviated Farlow’s memory of the pawn shop. But the pawn shop is a dead end.” He sat up. “We have to get him out.”

Draco glared at him. “Have you been _listening_? If you do that and something happens to his — his father — he won’t forgive you.”

“I’m not trying to save him, or his father,” Harry snapped. “Theo kept those three memories and threw away the rest, presumably because those three are the only pieces he would need should he ever have to complete the puzzle again. We need to get him out, show him the memories, and make him tell us where he buried the locket.”

“And what if he refuses?” Draco argued. “Show him the memories and you put him right back to where he was before he Obliviated himself, and guess what, Potter, there’s no guarantee he’ll choose any differently. What are you going to do, torture it out of him?”

“There’s Veritaserum,” Harry said. “There’s Imperius. _You_ thought of that, I might add.”

Draco’s eyes were as hard as stone. “If that’s how you want to win the war.”

“Oh, that’s rich,” Harry returned viciously. “Suddenly _you’re_ the one concerned about morals?”

Draco got up. He said, back turned, “You can’t do that to him, to his father.”

“I can,” Harry said, standing up as well. “To win the war. If that’s what it takes. Then I can and I will.”

“It’s not your _choice_,” Draco snarled, spinning around.

“People will _die_,” Harry yelled. “People are _dying_. Unless you have a better idea for finding the locket, Draco, we lose. This way, at least, we can get Theo out, and if … if we could get his father out, too —“

Draco laughed despairingly, mockingly. “His father would never turn. You saw the letter. ‘Better them than us.’”

“‘Better me than you,’” Harry quoted back. “His father wants Theo safe, too.”

“That’s between them,” Draco said, letting out a long shaking breath and walking away. “It’s not your choice.”

In the space separating them Harry saw once again the body of Lucius Malfoy, sliced in two.

He said: “Draco, it doesn’t matter. I still have to choose.”

***

The pawn shop was empty when they returned to it.

They were more careful this time, going in Cloaked and Silenced. The display cabinets inside were still broken, glass and dried blood all over the floor. Most disturbing was the section where Harry had thrown the Quicksand Cache: the sand was frozen and stuck together, rent through with several deep gouges as though a huge beast had clawed its way out.

The back room was mostly unchanged, except the candles and the wizarding books were no longer there. Neither was Theo.

Across the street from the pawn shop was a small Chinese restaurant and takeaway with roasted peking ducks hanging in the display window. It was run by a small family who lived in the flat above, and their tiny sitting room had a perfect view of the pawn shop entrance. At Harry’s suggestion, Draco lightly Confunded the family into thinking that they were friends of the eldest son, visiting for a short while. It was better than Imperius, Harry reasoned uneasily, thinking of Dumbledore passing a blank piece of paper to a Muggle woman in an orphanage. He had to do it.

They took shifts — always one watching, the other sleeping or procuring food, usually from downstairs — but it was still tedious work. No one could apparate inside the shop while the ward was still active (they checked, daily), but anyone going into the shop could approach while Disillusioned. However, this invisible person could only enter via the front door, which, apart from being visually obvious, would also ring the bell. Silencing a bell was easy, but disguising the visual truth of a thing using illusion was harder, and the process would give Theo away anyway. At least, such was Harry’s reasoning, which he began to question more and more as the days wore on. It was stupid: they had to pay constant vigilance to nothing in the off-chance it would become something. If this was what Auror life was like, Harry would definitely pass.

After ten days, it became obvious that their ability to focus had deteriorated dramatically, and still no one, invisible or otherwise, had gone into the shop. Harry was ready to admit that Theo was not coming back. Or rather, he was ready to admit that they needed to try something else. Besides which, the Wong family was becoming increasingly more confused; Adam, their ‘friend,’ kept making references to events in the past that had never happened, and his mother started waking up at all hours to ask if they were hungry or needed anything to drink, as though she thought they’d just arrived. It took longer for Confundus Charms to wear off on Muggles than it did on wizards, but it still wore off, which meant that Draco had had to keep refreshing it once per day. Harry was sort of worried that they’d do permanent damage if they kept it up.

In fact, Draco, who had made no objection to the first Confundus, had already started looking worried by the fourth. Harry pretended not to notice, and Draco said nothing until the night of the tenth day, when he sat up abruptly on the old worn couch upon which he should have been napping and announced, “Potter, we should stop.”

It was almost closing time: the restaurant’s last customers were leaving. Harry watched one couple saunter away, arm in arm, full and happy. He said, “Yeah, I agree.”

They cleaned up their spot by the window. Harry hid some Muggle currency between the padding of the couch and elsewhere around the flat. Hopefully, the family would find the notes and assume that it was money they’d misplaced. He saw it as a selfish act, since he was doing it to make himself feel better, but still: they’d eaten the family’s food, and that, at least, they could pay for.

Once he was done, they disapparated with a quiet _pop_, and just like that they were back at the seaside.

Harry looked out at the ocean and the dark night sky as Draco opened the door to Ursa-at-Sea, and said, “We need to go to Swallow’s Rest.”

“Why? You wouldn’t be able to enter,” Draco said. He went inside.

Harry followed. “We have to find him.”

Draco walked to the dining table and braced his hands on its surface, his shoulders a straight line. “If he’s at Swallow’s Rest, you won’t be able to enter. If he’s at the Manor, you’ll be delivering yourself to the Dark Lord. If he’s anywhere else — he knows how not to be found, same as all the rest of us.”

For the past ten days, Draco had only spoken to Harry in this manner: business-like, to the point, dispassionate. Mostly, he hadn’t spoken at all. The shadows underneath his eyes were so pronounced they may as well have been bruises.

“I think you’re being unreasonable,” Harry told him.

“I think you’re being stupid,” Draco returned.

“You always think that,” said Harry, going around to stand on the other side of the table, tilting his head to try and catch Draco’s line of sight, which was angled downward. “But you’re wrong. This time you’re wrong. You know it. We have to find him, and as impossible as it might be, I need your genuine help.”

Draco raised his head, eyes flashing. “You think I’m not helping you in earnest?”

“You don’t want Theo found,” Harry snapped. “Am I wrong?” When Draco didn’t answer immediately, he went on, “You have some sort of fucked up moral code — no, you’re just, you don’t want to come between Theo and his father. I know that. I understand. But it’s bloody unreasonable. Theo made his choices; I have to make mine. We need to destroy the locket —“

“I _know_,” Draco said thinly. “I’ve heard it all already.”

“Have you? Did you hear the part about people dying? Because I —“

“I don’t give a fuck about people dying!” Draco yelled.

Neither of them had yet bothered spelling alight the lamps along the walls, and the only light was from the waning moon, which came in weakly through the diagonal slits of the windows. Despite that, Harry felt that he could see everything very clearly: he knew this room, knew this house, knew this person.

“You care,” Draco continued. “But I don’t. I tried, once, because I thought — you know that book? How do you think Archer’s story ended, for me? I don’t care about people I’ve never met, Harry. I don’t even care about most of the ones I have. I’m not a good person. If I could keep Mother safe, if I could keep you safe, if I could keep Pansy and the rest of my Slytherins safe, I don’t care who dies, who suffers. I’d cast the curse myself if I had to.”

“Would you?” Harry questioned.

“It’s not so simple, I know,” Draco admitted quietly. “You care, so I wouldn’t.”

“No, that’s not what I meant,” Harry said evenly. “I think you couldn’t, in the first place. You’re not so ruthless. You’re full of contradictions. You don’t want to hurt Theo. You didn’t want to keep Confunding that family.”

“I don’t want to hurt Theo,” said Draco, “not because it’s Theo, but because —“

Because of Lucius. Harry knew. He shook his head, once, and Draco cut himself off with a grimace.

“That’s what I mean,” Harry said. “You’re not seeing reason.”

Draco was silent for moment. Then he said, “And has it occurred to you that you’re too full of reason? That you’re doing what Dumbledore would have done?”

Harry flinched, then grit his teeth. “I don’t see any other way.”

Draco stopped leaning on the table and pulled out a chair, sitting down. “As long as we don’t know where Theo is and can’t find him, or can’t go looking in the places he might be, then we have to try something else, or switch focus for now to one of the other Horcruxes.” He hesitated. “I didn’t want to bring this up earlier, because you wouldn’t have listened, but I’ve been thinking about that memory with Theo and his mother’s portrait. We’d assumed that any clues in what they said to each other would have to be deciphered by Theo, but what if that’s not the case? Or even if it is, Theo isn’t necessarily the only one we can ask.”

Frowning, Harry said slowly, “You … mean the portrait. You want to ask the portrait.”

Draco nodded. “Legilimency doesn’t work on portraits, obviously, so it’s safer on that front; Theo would have thought of that. And well — that portrait is broken; hardly anyone would think to interrogate it in the first place.”

“You just told me we can’t get into Swallow’s Rest,” Harry reminded him.

“If you were Aristides Nott, and you loved your wife,” Draco said, “would you only paint one portrait of her? Even following convention, most wizarding portraits are taken at least twice, so that the subject may have some freedom of movement between different locations.”

“All right, but then we have a new problem: how do we find another painting of Mrs Nott?”

Draco nodded in the direction of the sitting room. “To begin with, we can ask another portrait who might’ve known her.”

***

Walburga’s frame was empty, and in any case it was late, so they decided to leave it until the morning.

They went into the same bedroom.

Harry stopped beside the bed. “You’re sleeping here?”

Draco looked annoyed. “This was originally my room, Potter.”

“You’re the one who put our clothes into the same wardrobe!” Harry exclaimed.

“Stop shouting, I’m tired.” Grumpily, Draco pulled back the sheets. Then he seemed to remember that he was still in the Muggle attire they’d dressed in to move around London, and turned to get changed.

Harry left to wash himself in the bathroom, giving Draco the ensuite. When he came back Draco was already settled in, back turned, breathing deeply in a very convincing manner. Harry suppressed his urge to roll his eyes. Quickly, he put away his wand and glasses on the bedside table and got under the covers, shoving at Draco’s shoulder. Draco said nothing in response, which meant that he was absolutely, one hundred percent, wide awake.

Irritated, Harry positioned himself so that they each had their backs towards each other with a careful gap in between, not touching.

Draco made a sound — just as though he were asleep and dreaming — and pulled the sheet towards himself. After several minutes passed, he did it again.

Harry turned back around and kicked him.

“_Ow_, Potter,” Draco said. “What? I was asleep.”

“You’re impossible,” Harry announced. “And no you weren’t, you massive liar.” He grabbed Draco’s shoulder and tugged.

“Stop manhandling me,” Draco complained.

Harry pulled him closer, rearranging the sheets in the process so that it was properly distributed over them both. Draco sighed theatrically.

There was no moonlight now; clouds must have come in. Still, everything here was familiar; everything here was something Harry knew. He whispered, “What you said earlier, about not caring.”

Draco tensed.

Harry went on, “I don’t — I’m not sure — what is it do you think it means, to save people? To be a hero?” He paused, waiting for Draco to scoff, or laugh, but Draco only turned around, a shadow in shadow. “Dumbledore took action based on the bigger picture, and he saved people. Didn’t he?” Harry stopped again. “Sometimes,” he murmured, “I’m quite sure that I don’t care either. And then I think maybe I should have let the Hat put me in Gryffindor; then maybe I would — I’d do this all properly.”

Draco’s face was half-pressed into the pillow; his voice was muffled. “You would still be you, Potter. The House doesn’t make the person.”

“Doesn’t it?”

“It influences which peers you interact with.” There was a pause. “What you’re saying is that if we weren’t — if we hadn’t come to this point together, then you’d have less doubts.” Another pause. “That’s probably true.”

“Courage like the lion’s roar,” Harry said, then exhaled. “I don’t have doubts. It’s not that. I know that this is the right thing to do, and that I have to do it. I wouldn’t consider not doing it. I only mean — I mean that I’d be better at it. I mean that I can understand about not caring.”

Draco gave a low chuckle. “Are you trying to console me on not being a good person by empathising with my lack of empathy?”

Harry smiled into the dark, but he didn’t want to joke. “Were you reading _Archer and the Tree of Before_ over and over again because you wanted a different ending?”

It took Draco a long time to answer. “Mother told me to read it,” he said finally. “Ever since I was little, she always had books to recommend me, and she always had a particular reason for the recommendation.” Draco sighed. “Sometimes, it was just because she thought I’d like it. That was the case most of the time if it was fiction.” He shifted restlessly, turning to face the ceiling and bringing up his knees. “The first time I read _Archer_, I hated it. I didn’t know why Mother wanted me to read it. I thought it was stupid. The villagers kept losing their magic and dying, and in the end Archer was all alone, and then he died too. It was a terrible story.” He shifted again. “I hated it, Harry. I hated it, but it was my story.”

Harry sat up. “No, it’s not.”

He could feel Draco’s eyes on him, even though he couldn’t quite see. Draco said, “It was. That’s the enchantment. The story changes depending on the person reading it; it reflects who you are. And this is the kind of person I am: I can’t save the world, I’m not like you. I read it again and again and again and it was all the same misery. Archer stays in the village and dies. Archer leaves the village and lives as an outcast. Archer hears of Syscallon and beseeches a friend to journey with him to find it, but along the way he’s too weary to continue. Archer meets Gaea, and she hates him. Archer meets Gaea, and he lets her die. Archer —“ his voice turned thin — “Archer climbs the mountain, at last, and finds the elder tree, and he sits at its roots for months, too much of a coward to sacrifice himself, too indecisive to sacrifice anything else, and then it’s too late.”

Harry let this all sink in. “That’s not your story. None of those tales are true. _This_ is your story, _this_ is true: you met me, and I don’t hate you at all, you know that. You know that I — you know what you are to me,” he said in a rush. “You left Hogwarts with me, and you won’t let me die, and we’ll keep climbing the mountain together, and at the end — at the end, Draco, it’ll be all right. It’ll be okay. It won’t be terrible.”

“Harry,” Draco said quietly. He said it so quietly. “I’m terrified. What if — what if I’ve already made a mistake I can’t fix? What if it’s already too late?” His right hand found Harry’s wrist and clasped it. “Do you know that it keeps coming back to me, if I let myself relax? I keep finding myself back there, in the Manor, spells screaming all around us, and Father’s voice in my head, telling me to stay still, telling me to obey, and then the flash of — of green, and then you, and then — then —“ his grip tightened — “It wasn’t like any of it was clear. It wasn’t like I knew what I was doing, not really. It wasn’t like I understood that here the road forked and I could only take one path. It just happened. Do you understand? It just happened. You shouldn’t ask me what it means to save people, or to be a hero. I don’t know. I have no idea. _You’re_ the one who always wants to do the right thing, who knows what the right thing is. I’m — not like that. All I know is that anything can happen suddenly, and then you can’t take it back.”

In the middle of the night, with the world asleep, the ocean always crept in closer. The sound of the waves was in the very walls; Harry felt as though they were wrapped within the ebbing tide, pulled by a distant gravity. He said, “Draco,” and bit his lip. He wasn’t sure what else to say. He knew what he wanted to _do_, which was to touch Draco, to hold him, to free him from fear of the future and guilt from the past, but he didn’t know how, and neither of those things were his to unburden anyway.

When Harry didn’t continue, Draco shifted yet again, letting go of Harry’s wrist. He pulled at the covers. “Merlin’s sake,” he said, but without bite. “Lie down, will you?”

Harry complied, settling onto his side, surrounded by the sea. “I think you should stop reading that book.”

Draco made an ambiguous noise which communicated only that he had heard and not that he agreed. He brought his face in close until Harry could feel his breath. Their foreheads touched, and Draco whispered, “Good night, Harry,” and then he moved away.

***

“You know the lineage,” Walburga said.

They’d woken up late; it was well past lunchtime already. Harry had gone straight from bed to the portrait, which had thankfully been occupied this time. Walburga did not look impressed with his tousled appearance.

“You mean Mrs Nott’s lineage?” Harry asked. “Er. Actually, no. I don’t.”

Walburga raised her painted eyebrows. “No one has made an effort to teach you basic general knowledge? What about your adopted family? Who brought you up, child?”

“He grew up with Muggles, Great Aunt Wally,” Draco said, coming in from the direction of the bathroom. Unlike Harry, he’d taken the time to wash himself and dress properly in a set of dark green robes. He was holding two apples from the pantry, and tossed the second to Harry.

“Thanks,” said Harry.

“Muggles,” repeated Walburga, her mouth forming an ugly shape. “Well, I’d heard the rumours, but I certainly didn’t think them true. Utterly disgraceful.”

“It was Dumbledore’s doing,” explained Draco.

Walburga sneered. “Dumbledore. If there ever were a man who desired true influence and control … It was obvious from the moment he turned down the position for Minister. I said to Orion that Dumbledore had his eye on Hogwarts, and as sure as prophecy one year later he was appointed Headmaster. Helena Bulstrode was on the Board of Governors then, and she confessed to me privately that the pressure was too great. She could not stand against the appointment any longer.”

“You mean he threatened her?” Harry asked, frowning.

“Threaten? Oh no,” Walburga said. “Threaten! Of course not. Dumbledore had already spent nigh on two decades teaching at Hogwarts, and had built himself an impressive network. He was never as obvious about it as old Horace Slughorn, but that only made it more effective. By the ‘60s Dumbledore had favours available in every branch of wizarding Britain and some beyond, and that doesn’t take into account the older ties he built before his teaching post that came with the raw power people handed to him after he toppled Grindelwald. Helena’s son was pursuing a position in the Department of Magical Games and Sports — silly boy — and she did not want to jeopardise his career.”

That still sounded a lot like a veiled threat to Harry, and despite his lingering dislike for Dumbledore he found it hard to imagine the man keeping someone else from a job in order to secure his own, but then again — how much did he know about Dumbledore, really?

In any case, they were off-topic. He said to Walburga, “That’s interesting. It really is, but, if you don’t mind, I’m not clear on why you brought up Mrs Nott’s lineage?”

Walburga’s expression indicated that she could ramble on about Dumbledore for quite some time, but she answered, in the tones of one imparting significant information: “Estelle Nott was a Fawley. Daughter of Eugene Fawley, who was brother to Hector Fawley.”

“Okay,” Harry said slowly.

“The Fawleys are Hufflepuffs, generally,” Draco explained, swallowing the last bite of his apple and Vanishing the core. “They’re not on good terms with the Notts. In the 16th century they had a dispute over land ownership, which the Fawleys lost.”

“Ah,” Harry said, trying to sound enlightened.

“Neither family approved of the joining, naturally,” Walburga went on. “Yet Aristides and Estelle were very much in love, and regardless of all other objections, the line was pure. There were some hexes thrown at the wedding, of course.”

“I could have told you all this,” Draco said to Harry.

“Yeah well,” Harry replied, “I wasn’t actually asking about weddings or lineages. I only asked if there was another portrait of Mrs Nott somewhere.”

“Lineage is always necessary to know,” Walburga said reprovingly. “There was not only a wedding: several years later, there was also a funeral. The Notts were always travelling in those days. Estelle wanted to see everything, and Aristides wanted to paint her in everything. And then one day they were not careful, and Estelle came back to England carrying a curse from abroad. They kept it quiet at first, but once Estelle’s fingers fell off and she was admitted to St Mungo’s speaking in tongues and half-mad, it was obvious to everyone. There were whispers that they had ignored advice from the cursebreakers in Egypt and gone too deep into a pyramid. Others said it was likely to do with that Lord Voldemort — Aristides was one of those advocates for the cause at the time.”

Harry spent a moment taking this all in. “If he painted her during their travels, then there must be lots of portraits of her. We just have to find one.”

“It may be impossible if you cannot access Swallow’s Rest.”

“Why?”

“During his prime, Aristides Nott held many exhibitions,” Walburga said. “After Estelle’s death, he stopped. He locked up every single painting of his that was not a commission, or already bought and paid for.”

“He never gave anything away? Not even to Hogwarts?” Draco asked. Seeing Harry’s questioning look, he added, “It’s common for painters to gift paintings to public spaces, or to places like Hogwarts, in an attempt to establish a legacy. It’s partly why Hogwarts has so many paintings.” Quietly: “Father told me.”

“That I cannot say,” replied Walburga. “However, even if he did, I doubt he would have given away a portrait of Estelle, unless she asked him to.”

Harry sighed heavily. “Then we’re back at square one. We’ll have to go to Swallow’s Rest.”

“Perhaps so,” said Walburga. “What is it that you need to ask of Estelle Nott? If you don’t need the version painted by Aristides in particular, there is likely another instance of her that exists.”

He stared at her in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“This is why lineage is important: you can infer what people will do based on the people they belong to.” Walburga got out her wand and conjured a wooden bench for herself in the grass. Sitting down, she continued, “The Fawleys avoided the Notts for generations, and so for generations commissioned their family portraits from other artists across Europe. It is highly likely that they had a portrait of Estelle taken from before her marriage.”

Draco did not appear elated at this news. “If it was by a different painter and unlinked, then it’s not the same portrait.”

“A different instance, correct,” Walburga confirmed.

“Then it won’t have the information we need,” Draco said despairingly.

A storm was brewing on the horizon, drifting along the edge of France. The clouds had been moving slowly across from right to left, and just now were framed perfectly in the diagonal line of the third window. As Harry watched, a hairline thin streak of lightning shot towards the waves and disappeared.

Grimly, he said, “It’s the best lead we have. Where do the Fawleys live?”

***

The Fawley estate was in Berkshire. Walburga knew the address, but as neither Harry nor Draco had ever been there before, they decided not to apparate. Luckily, it was close to a small village the wizards called Siren’s Blue (the Muggles called it Hamwich; Harry wasn’t going to ask), so they were able to Floo in to the local pub from the Leaky Cauldron.

Harry tumbled out of the fireplace with his usual grace, sneezing.

“Come on,” Draco said.

“I think you ruined my nose,” Harry told him, still sneezing. Given how often their faces had been in the paper during their _Prophet_ campaign, they’d agreed to transfigure aspects of each other’s appearance for safety. Nothing too dramatic, but enough so that they would not be recognisable at a passing glance. Harry had made Draco’s hair a darker blond and unsharpened his chin somewhat. Draco had turned Harry’s eyes brown, obscured his scar, and done something to his nose, making it twice as large. (He’d also tried to straighten the hair, but Harry’s hair took instruction from nothing and nobody.)

“_I_ think you’ll never get the hang of Floo travel if you live to be five hundred,” Draco said, unimpressed. He thumped Harry across the shoulders, brushing off soot. “Don’t breathe in when you’re spinning.”

They left the pub; Harry squinted into the sun. He’d drunk Draco’s potion again, the one from Christmas, and was without his glasses.

Draco was consulting his hand drawn map. “This way,” he said. “It’s a bit of a walk. Should’ve brought brooms.”

“Can’t fly, there’s Muggles about,” Harry said, as a young helmeted boy riding a scooter approached from the opposite direction, his eyes slipping by the pub’s exterior unseeing.

“Of course there are,” Draco huffed. As the boy passed them, he shouted, “Constant vigilance!”

The poor kid gave a little jump, startled, and scooted away as fast as possible.

“Oh my god,” Harry said. “Malfoy.”

“What,” Draco said, nonchalant, and then, “Turn left here.”

It was about an hour’s walk up a mild incline, winding through patches of farmland until they came to a tiny dirt path blocked off by an old rusty metal fence. In front of the fence were two signs that said ‘NO TRESPASSING’ and ‘PRIVATE PROPERTY.’ Beyond the fence was another smaller sign written in a cursive font: ‘Visitors please ring bell; failure to do so may provoke the trees.’

“The trees?” Harry said.

“Typical of Hufflepuffs,” Draco scoffed. “Issuing warnings about their security system.”

They hadn’t walked five paces down the dirt path when it was suddenly no longer a tiny dirt path but wide and paved with stone. More alarmingly, an army of beech trees had sprung into being to line the path on either side. Harry eyed the neatly spaced trunks with resignation. If he had to fight murderous plants, then he had to fight murderous plants. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Draco, on the other hand, did not seem to be concerned. He went up close to the trees on the left side, scrutinising them. Then, noticing that Harry was doing nothing, he said, “Check over there, won’t you?”

“For what, exactly?”

“The bell, Potter,” came the reply, but before Harry could even react, Draco exclaimed, “Ah, here it is. They put it right at the beginning.” And a pleasant ringing sounded through the air.

Indeed, there was a silver bell about the size of a baby’s fist tied on a long string to the lower branches of the tree Draco was standing at.

“Is it meant to be a doorbell?” Harry asked, puzzled. “Why hide it?”

“To discourage unsolicited visitors,” Draco said, in that voice he used when he was re-evaluating Harry’s intelligence.

“So, er, people like us? But then why the sign telling us to ring the bell?”

“Like I said, Hufflepuffs.”

Harry was about to ask if all pureblood estates had some version of this without the helpful warning sign, but at that moment there was a _crack_, and a horse carriage without any horses appeared in front of them.

A house-elf jumped down from the driver’s seat and curtsied, spreading a garment that might have been made from curtains, but which mostly looked like a normal dress. She squeaked, “Sirs is being welcome. If sirs pleases, Bessy is guiding sirs to Fawley Hill.”

The carriage door opened. Draco got in without hesitation. Harry shrugged to himself and followed.

He was expecting a bumpy ride (he’d noted that the stone paving was not the smoothest) and was curious about how the carriage functioned if nothing was pulling it at all, so when Bessy got back into her seat and there was another loud _crack_ accompanied by the familiar uncomfortable squeezing feeling of apparition, he was taken by surprise.

“Ow,” Draco complained.

“Sorry,” Harry said, and removed his elbow from Draco’s ribs.

Bessy had already opened the door again and was waiting for them to disembark. “Sirs pleases to follow Bessy.”

His first impression of the house was that it was undoubtedly magical. It had the homely aesthetics of a comfortable stone cottage, except that it was just so _big_, like someone had started building it without proper planning and then just kept adding more storeys while also expanding horizontally without much regard for the necessary order of things, with the result being that at least one room was barely attached and mostly floating in midair (the Burrow, Harry reflected, at least made an attempt to prop things up with sticks). What really gave it away, though, were the flowering vines covering the building, which moved as though it had a mind of its own, which it probably did. As they approached the front door, a great big length of it rustled downward from the second storey balcony to observe them, then scurried away again, changing position so that a patch of stone previously covered was now exposed.

Bessy led them directly into the drawing room, seated them on the couch, and said, “Sirs pleases to be waiting, Master Fawley is joining sirs shortly,” before disappearing with another _crack_.

The inside of the house, at least, did not have any abnormally mobile plantlife, for which Harry was grateful. There was a grand piano by the window playing a gentle tune. On the wall adjacent to the entrance was a large fullbody portrait of a man in old-fashioned robes who glanced at them curiously but remained mostly still. He was surrounded by several smaller landscape paintings of pleasant scenery, mostly depicting rivers and farmland. In one of them, a young girl was riding a pony.

Tea popped into being on the table in front of them. Harry was just blowing on his to cool it down when a tall man with dark brown hair and a preoccupied expression walked into the room.

“Sullivan sent you two, I presume,” he said by way of greeting.

“Mr Fawley,” Draco said, standing up. Harry put down the teacup hurriedly and stood as well.

“All good, lads,” Fawley said, waving at them to sit down. “No need for formality. How’s Sully?”

“Er,” Harry said. “Actually, sir, we’re here to ask if you would —“

“Yes yes, I know,” interrupted Fawley swiftly. “He hasn’t let up with the owls about it, oh no, there’s at least one a day, and now he’s sent you!”

Harry exchanged a look with Draco. “I think there’s been a misunderstanding. We weren’t sent by Sullivan. I’m not sure who Sullivan is, in fact.”

Spots of colour appeared on Fawley’s cheeks, and his eyes focused on them fully, as though Harry had slapped him in the face and woken him up. “Not sure who Sullivan…? Who are you, then?” He raised his right hand to his breast, where presumably his wand was hidden in an inner robe pocket.

Harry tried to look as non-threatening as possible. “I’m Harry Potter. And this is Draco Malfoy.”

“The two of you would have to do better than that, if you couldn’t get ahold of authentic hair for Polyjuice,” Fawley said accusingly. “Everyone knows Harry Potter has green eyes. I ask again: who are you?”

“We are who I said we are. We put on disguises,” Harry explained. “If you’ll please remain calm, we’ll prove it to you.” Very slowly, he took out his wand, pointed it at Draco, and said, “_Finite Incantatem_.” Draco did the same, then reached over and pushed back Harry’s fringe obligingly. Harry sneezed.

“By the badger,” said Fawley in awe after a long pause. “It _is_ you. That’s the scar. Green eyes, too.” In the next moment, though, a flash of doubt crossed his face. “What about the glasses?”

“Um, I don’t always wear them.”

“Okay,” Fawley said gradually. “But if it really is you, why don’t you know Sullivan?”

“Sorry,” Harry said, “who’s Sullivan?”

“My son!” Fawley exclaimed with indignation. “He’s in your year at Hogwarts!”

Harry turned to Draco. “Is he?”

“Well,” Fawley allowed. “Might have been the year below.”

“Definitely the year below,” Draco drawled.

“He talks about you in his letters,” Fawley said. “I thought perhaps you were friends.” He gestured at them again to sit down. “How can I help you? How is Sully — well, I mean. How is the situation at Hogwarts? Sullivan has been trying to convince me to go, says it’ll be safer, but the wards here at Fawley Hill are quite strong, as you would have seen when you came in.”

Strong was not precisely the word Harry would have chosen. He said, “Hogwarts is fine. I’m sure that Sully — Sullivan is doing well. As for why we’re here, we were wondering if perhaps we could speak with one of your family portraits.”

Fawley blinked, a frown growing on his brow. “A family portrait?”

“It’s crucial for the war effort,” Harry said. “I can’t tell you exactly why, but you would be making a big contribution.”

Still frowning, Fawley said, “Well, now, I cannot imagine how a portrait of ours could assist you, but let it not be said that I turned down Harry Potter in his time of need. If the portrait itself is amenable, Harry — may I call you Harry? — I’ll be delighted to introduce you.”

“Great,” Harry said. “We’d like to speak to Estelle Nott — I mean, Estelle Fawley, please.”

The frown slipped off Fawley’s face to be replaced with a kind of blank tension. “Sorry,” he said, trying for a smile and failing. “Who?”

“Estelle Fawley,” Harry said again, slower this time.

“Oh!” Fawley said, attempting another smile. This one took better. “Of course, Estelle. She was my cousin, you know. But more like a sister, really. Neither of us had any siblings, you see, so our parents would have us play together as children. Well, Estelle. Yes, we do have a portrait of her.” And he turned around to the wall with the paintings, and pointed at the one with the little girl on a pony. “There she is. Estelle! Ella, dear, some visitors would like to speak to you.”

The girl, who looked to be no older than twelve or thirteen, waved at them. “Hello,” she called, her voice sounding from very far away.

“Do you mind, Ella, going to your room?” Fawley asked in the sugary voice people sometimes used to speak to children. “Once you’re in there I’ll bring the frame down for you; it’ll make conversation easier.”

“You needn’t trouble yourself, Hugo,” boomed a deep baritone. It came from the man in the large fullbody portrait. “Estelle can come here, and I will remove myself elsewhere for a time.”

“Ah,” said Fawley. “Thank you, Great-Grandfather.”

“Thank you, sir,” Harry added, to be polite.

The man nodded at them, and strode out of frame onto the banks of a gurgling river in autumn. He crossed a small stone bridge into the next picture, where a flock of sheep were being minded by a dog. The dog jumped the fence and came bounding to pant at his feet; he scratched it behind the ears, and together they passed through the edge of that frame to yet some other painting in the house.

The little girl who was Estelle Fawley walked into the vacated frame and was suddenly lifesize. Harry looked at her in dismay; he could see the physical resemblance to Theo’s mother from the Pensieve memory, but this version of her was far too young. He couldn’t see how she would be of any help.

“It’s nice to meet you,” said Estelle politely. She was dressed in simple outdoor robes, her long tawny hair tied up with a ribbon.

“Hi Estelle,” said Harry. “I’m Harry. This is Draco.”

“How do you do,” said Draco.

Estelle tilted her head in examination. “You look like Malfoy,” she told Draco. “Lucius Malfoy. He’s in my year at Hogwarts.”

Draco flinched. “I’m his son.”

“Oh,” said Estelle. “Really? Gab says Malfoy puts on such airs. Gab is my friend,” she informed them significantly. “He’s in Ravenclaw. Next year we’re going to go to Hogsmeade together, in February.” She put a hand on her mouth and smiled behind it.

“I … see,” Harry replied. There was an awkward silence. Fawley had not vacated the room — Harry wondered if it would be rude to ask him to leave, then decided not to bother. He said to Estelle, “We need your help with something. We’re looking for a … a hiding spot for something.”

Estelle’s eyebrows rose. “A hiding spot?”

“Well, you see,” Harry explained, “in the present, which is your future, you have a son. He’s hidden away something rather important, and we think you may know the location.”

“A son!” Estelle said, eyes wide. A faint flush rose to her cheeks. “I’ve a son? I mean, I know I’m dead —“ she waved a hand, dismissing this fact as inconsequential — “so I suppose it’s only right that I have a son, but oh — oh! Did I marry Gab?” Abruptly, she seemed embarrassed by her own question and turned away from them, hiding her grin.

“Er,” Harry said.

“Now now,” said Fawley from behind them. A clink sounded as he put down his teacup. “It’s not proper for us to speak of your later life, Estelle dear.”

“Why not?” Estelle asked, turning back. “Hugo, you never tell me anything. Ever since I woke up, it was always: ‘oh well, perhaps later.’ And I know that you talk to —“ 

“Ella, please,” cut in Fawley.

She made a face at him and crossed her arms, turning back to Harry. “_Did_ I marry Gab? What’s my son’s name?”

“You named your son Theodore,” Harry told her. “His name is Theodore Nott.”

“Not?” repeated Estelle. “Not what?”

“Lads,” said Fawley, “perhaps we could just —“

“Nott, as in the name,” Harry said, thinking that he might as well get it over with. “You married Aristides Nott.”

“What?” said Estelle in confusion. “You mean — but there isn’t a — you mean _Nott_? A Nott? But Mother says the Notts are a wicked family — and, and I wouldn’t. Ew. They have one son and he’s an old bachelor. Dad told me he’ll never marry. Even if he marries now and has a son, he’ll be a baby. I can’t marry a baby.”

Harry was rapidly feeling out of his depth. He shot a pleading look at Draco.

“Of course you can’t marry a baby,” Draco said smoothly. “You married a man, whom you loved. You met him after you graduated Hogwarts.”

“But he was a _Nott_, you said.”

Draco gave her a conspiratorial smirk. “It caused quite a scandal.”

“Mother and Father wouldn’t let me,” Estelle asserted. “They’d _disown_ me.” But she said it in a gush, as though being disowned would be a daring adventure.

“Well,” Harry said carefully. “I don’t know if they disowned you, but you certainly did it anyway. Estelle, I’m sorry to be blunt, but we need to know: can you think of anywhere at all that Theo — your son Theo — might have gone to hide something important? It was in a forest, that’s all we know. Are there any places that come to mind?”

“A forest,” Estelle echoed, frowning. “Like the Forbidden Forest?”

Harry shook his head. “It wasn’t the Forbidden Forest.” That much, at least, he could tell from the memory.

Estelle shrugged. “I don’t know, then.”

“What about a spire?” asked Draco suddenly. “Does that mean anything to you?”

“Oh,” Estelle said, sounding faintly surprised. “The spire, as in … you mean the treehouse on the eastern hill?” She pointed towards the windows. “Hugo and I used to play there when we were little. Before Hogwarts. If you go that way you’ll see it. But it’s not in a forest, it’s on the edge of the vineyard.”

“Why is it called the spire?” Harry asked curiously.

“The tree it was built on was very tall,” Fawley interjected unexpectedly. “It was struck by lightning one year, and part of the trunk fell away to leave a sharp point. And so we called it the spire.” He got up and stood beside them. “But I’m sorry to say lads, there’s no point in your going there. Ella is right: there’s no forest. It’s just a solitary tree.”

“_You_ go there,” Estelle said sharply. “The nymph in the woodlands painting in the sun room says she sees you going there all the time, and I _know_ that’s where you —“

“Ella,” Fawley said in a warning tone.

“Stop treating me like a child!” she protested. “It’s not fair at all; it’s not my fault none of you updated me before I died. It’s horrible feeling like I don’t even know who I’m supposed to be and — and I have a son, they said. Why have I never seen him? Is it because none of you will let him visit because he’s a Nott?”

“I’m terribly sorry,” Fawley said hurriedly to Harry. “It’s best if you came back at another time, although I don’t see how she can help you further. I should have seen fit to inform you earlier: she gets rather distraught if anyone talks about her future, you see.”

“Stop it, Hugo,” said Estelle. Alarmingly, tears were forming in her painted eyes. “Stop it. You never used to be like this. It’s not fair!”

Draco bumped Harry’s shoulder. He said, “I see your point, Mr Fawley. Perhaps we could visit this treehouse instead?”

“Yes,” Harry agreed quickly. “If it’s not too much trouble.”

Fawley hesitated. “There’s nothing there to see, lads.”

“He’s lying,” Estelle cried. “It’s where he keeps the other me.”

“Ella —“

Estelle spoke over him: “Don’t pretend that she doesn’t exist. After I woke up, none of you wanted to talk to me. You were all always trying to talk to the other me. You kept her in Father’s room, as if that would stop me from finding out.” She drew herself up defiantly. “I went in there to talk to her one afternoon when no one else was there and found out that all the other paintings were right; she was broken. And — and so that’s why no one wants to talk to me about anything, because I must have gone crazy before I died, because I must have died terribly, because I must be a disgrace to our family name, but it’s not my fault, it’s not my _fault_ —“

“Ella!” Fawley put his hand on the frame. “Please.” Over his shoulder he said to Harry and Draco, “Would the two of you excuse us for a moment? Bessy will show you out.”

On cue, the house-elf appeared at the doorway. “This way, sirs.”

They followed her all the way out to the driveway, where the horseless carriage was still parked. It was an obvious sign that they had overstayed their welcome, but Harry had no intention of leaving. Luckily, Bessy disapparated again without trying to eject them from the premises altogether. Behind them, the flowering vines moved with a great rustle and covered the windows of the drawing room.

It was a warm, muggy day. Draco got out his wand and conjured a small blue orb; it floated in the air next to them and obligingly puffed a cool breeze across their faces. Neither of them spoke. There was no need: one look at Draco had told Harry that they were thinking the same thing.

About a quarter of an hour later, Fawley appeared. He was plainly uncomfortable to see them still waiting for him, but with visible effort drew forth an embarrassed smile.

“Well, lads,” he said, “I’m sorry that you had to see that. And I’m sorry we couldn’t be of more help.”

“Oh, on the contrary,” Draco drawled, “it was very enlightening. We hadn’t known that Aristides Nott had given anyone a painting of his wife, you see.”

Fawley’s smile wilted into a grimace. “That painting has caused us such grief. I don’t enjoy speaking of it.”

“It may be crucial to win the war,” Harry told him unsympathetically. “We must see it.”

For a moment it seemed like Fawley would continue to deny them, but he gave a defeated sigh. “If you must, then.” He waved at the carriage and the doors sprung open. “After you.”

They got in, Harry somewhat warily. Fawley joined them in the seat across, but there was no crack of house-elf apparition to indicate Bessy’s presence. Instead, Fawley only rapped his knuckles on the panelling behind his head and commanded, “The spire.”

The carriage began to move, at first at a sedate pace, then faster and faster until the speed was not dissimilar to that of a Muggle car driving down a highway. It wasn’t as bumpy a ride as Harry had previously supposed.

“I wasn’t lying earlier when I said there’s nothing to see,” said Fawley as the scenery flashed past. “That treehouse has been abandoned for years, and as for the painting — Nott had it owled to us after the funeral, as if it wasn’t even something worth giving to us face to face. It came with no note or explanation, and indeed for a while we considered sending it back. The Estelle depicted in it isn’t the Ella that I knew, growing up. Either the portrait is broken or Estelle herself was …” He stopped and sighed again. “We put her up in the house and tried to speak to her, but it was futile. All she did was distress the other paintings, distress _us_, when she showed up at all. Eventually we decided to remove her.”

“You unbound her from the house?” Draco asked.

“We had to. On some nights she would wander from frame to frame talking to herself. Sometimes she would sing, and it wasn’t so bad. But other times, she would mutter curses and ugly things. Sully was only about four years old, then. It frightened him.” Fawley turned deliberately to stare out the window. “We’ll be there soon, lads.”

They rode the rest of the way in silence. Before long, the path began to climb uphill, and the carriage slowed to a gentle trotting pace. As the rush of the wind dropped away, Harry began to hear the distant chatter of high pitched voices.

“French Feira Fairies, you know,” Fawley explained offhandedly as the carriage stopped and they got out. He waved at the rows of grapevines below them. Harry could just see small clouds of purple and pink winged creatures darting in and out. “An ancestor thought they’d be a good idea. They look after the plants and keep away pests, it’s true, but they’re tribal and territorial, so every few years they get all worked up in their factions and try to kill each other and make a mess.”

“Oh,” Harry said.

“We used to have some on the Manor grounds,” Draco volunteered unexpectedly. “During Grandfather’s time. Then my father —“ his voice tightened, and grew stronger — “my father decided to be rid of them.”

“Did he?” Fawley said politely. “They’re rather difficult to eradicate completely, I’ve heard.”

“I never saw any in the gardens after I turned six.”

Fawley made a sound of interest, but let the topic drop. Following his lead, they climbed up a narrow path to the crest of a hill. Atop it, Harry could see the spire.

It was as it had been described: a once tall tree struck by lightning, with what remained of its trunk sharpened to a black point, jutting up into the sky. Its branches were uneven and leaned heavily towards one side, but that side was lush with leaves. Through them, Harry could just make out a rough structure that must have been the treehouse.

“It’s not large enough to fit all of us, I’m afraid,” Fawley said as they approached it. The grass around the tree’s roots was brown and struggling, a sign that the tree, despite its setbacks, still possessed a voracious hunger for life. “It used to have several rooms inside, but after the lightning strike the Extension Charm was damaged, so Ella’s mother removed it to be safe.”

From directly underneath, it looked like little more than a sad box formed by uneven panels of wood, attached perilously to a thin platform that had been spelled onto the thickest branch. A frayed and knotted rope dangled down.

Fawley tugged on it. “If you’ll wait a moment, I’ll get the painting and be right back.”

“No,” Harry disagreed. “I’d like to see the inside of the treehouse, just in case. I’ll go.”

If Fawley was insulted by Harry’s distrustful attitude, he didn’t show it. “All right.”

Harry hurled himself up the rope. It was harder than he had anticipated, but the climb was short, and soon he was pulling himself up onto the platform. The treehouse didn’t look much more impressive from this vantage. There was no door, just a low opening suitable to the height of a child. He had to crouch.

Part of him had been braced for a trap, however unlikely, and for several seconds he knelt with wand in hand, muscles tense, prepared for anything. But, for once, there was no danger. The treehouse was barely larger than the cupboard under the stairs, and the only things in it were an old mouldy blanket folded in a corner; a stack of wooden bowls and plates; some wizarding figurines of sea serpents and dragons; and an empty painting about the size of a magazine, leaning against the wall opposite the entrance.

The painting’s frame was an unassuming matte black wood of fine grain. It bound together an image of some sand dunes, peach coloured in twilight. Five tiny planets lined up perfectly in the centre of the horizon. Nothing moved except the stars, which twinkled faintly.

“It’s been unoccupied like that for years,” Fawley said when Harry rejoined them, painting in hand, on the ground. “The last time I saw her was just before Sully got his Hogwarts letter. She asked me how he was.” His voice was strained, and yet within it Harry detected a note of wistfulness.

“So you made a habit of checking on the painting?” asked Harry.

“I felt guilty,” replied Fawley, which was answer enough. “We should have been able to allow her a place in her ancestral home. But we feared what contact with her would do to Ella. Not to mention …” A shadow came into his eyes. “She was painted by Aristides Nott, and connected to all his other paintings in the Nott estate.”

“You didn’t like having a spy in the house,” Draco surmised.

“She wasn’t a spy,” denied Fawley fiercely. “Yet it unsettled me whenever I thought of it.” A pause. “I never imagined that Harry Potter of all people would one day come asking to see her, and that it would be important for the fight against You-Know-Who.” Another pause. “Is it true then, that Estelle married a Death Eater?”

Harry said simply, “Yes.”

Fawley shut his eyes and stepped back, as though the word had been a blow. “Well,” he said slowly as he opened them again, “I’d always suspected. Now I know.” He gathered himself, standing up straighter. “The two of you will want to borrow the painting.” It was a statement, not a question.

“We need to speak with her,” Harry confirmed. “We’ll return it to you once we have, I promise.” He added, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Fawley said with resignation. “I wish you luck with coaxing her into the frame. Merlin knows I’ve had no success.”

They started to make their way back to the carriage. Halfway there, Draco paused on the hill to look once more at the vineyard and its dusting of fairies. He said quietly, rather formally, “You know, Mr Fawley, you mistakened us as friends of your son, sent here to fetch you to Hogwarts. That wasn’t the purpose of our visit, but I think you should go. Your son no doubt worries about you. And it’s possible that you may attract other visitors interested in portraits of your cousin.” He turned around and fixed his gaze on Fawley.

Fawley’s mouth was open in surprise. “The rest of the family has already left. If even I … I can’t abandon the estate.”

“Neither Harry nor I intend that this war carries on forever,” Draco said resolutely. “You would be taking a temporary leave only.” He adjusted the collar of his robe, as though kindness to a stranger were an unfamiliar and illfitting garment. “If your entire family is already at Hogwarts, then that’s all the more reason. You should go and be with them. At least consider it more seriously than you have.”

It took them the rest of the way to the carriage until Fawley said, “All right, lad. I will.”


	26. Chapter 26

No matter what they did, they could not seem to entice Estelle Nott back into the painting.

“There’s a spell,” Draco had said, as they sat on the rocky steps outside Ursa-at-Sea and contemplated the empty frame, “that can summon an occupant of a painting. Father taught it to me when I was very young, and gave me a practice wand to cast it. Grandfather Abraxas, you see, was not often in his portrait, and he’d been very fond of me. I think Father thought that the spell would give us more chances to talk, and of course encourage me to interact with the other portraits, and learn a little of family history that way.” He tossed a grin at the ocean. “As it was, I went around harassing every empty portrait I came across by casting the spell and then running away. Father had to confiscate the practice wand and wouldn’t give it back for months.”

“What’s the spell?” Harry asked.

Draco took out the acacia wand and tapped it against the sand dunes. “_Knock knock_.”

“Sorry, what?” Harry let forth an incredulous laugh. “The spell is ‘knock knock’?”

“You won’t be laughing when Estelle Nott comes striding into view,” Draco admonished, and repeated, “_Knock knock_.”

“Who’s there?” Harry joked, unable to resist, and let Draco shove him sideways onto the wild grass in response.

He remained sceptical of the spell for days — it did not seem to be working at all — until one morning he gave in to temptation and tried it on Walburga’s portrait. Then it worked far too well. He spent all of breakfast suffering through a lecture on pureblood decorum as though he were five years old and hadn’t grown up with Muggles. Draco’s aura of supreme smugness had been nigh insufferable.

They had been giddy at making progress, at obtaining something which could aid their quest in earnest, and so the empty frame had seemed but a small setback. At first. As July carried on and Estelle Nott refused to appear, the positive swell of energy that had borne them aloft slowly died, and Harry found himself seated dully in front of the painting for hours on end, casting Draco’s silly spell with none of his previous levity. He even entertained the idea of joining the painting to the rest of the house. Perhaps if Estelle were offered the opportunity to explore a new location, she would be more inclined to visit. But Draco had vehemently disagreed and said it would be too dangerous to attach a new painting that had links to another location while the house was under Fidelius. They couldn’t be sure that it would not somehow betray the secret.

“Maybe,” Harry ventured despondently on an odd-numbered night, as he joined Draco in the observatory, “Fawley tricked us and it’s really just a painting of a desert.”

Draco was peering into the telescope and adjusting one of its knobs. “I doubt it. He had no reason for a deception like that.”

Harry doubted it, too. He sat down near Draco’s feet, trying to clear the weariness from his thoughts.

The observatory was not built like a Muggle one — not that Harry was overly familiar with Muggle observatories, but he was quite certain that Muggles would not have managed the concentric rings of floating platforms, nor the transparent dome of spellwork that kept out only the weather and allowed inward all light. The telescope itself was the most visually unremarkable thing there, being a long tube of silver inlaid with gold patterning, and even that was obviously magical: there was an apparatus attached near the eyepiece in which a wand could be placed. Draco had settled his own there, and periodically touched it to murmur a spell.

“Here,” he said after a while, tapping Harry lightly on the shoulder. “Come look.”

Harry got up obediently and looked through the eyepiece. It was slightly awkward as it always was with his glasses, and it took him a beat to realise what he was looking at.

“Have you ever seen Saturn’s rings in such detail?” Draco asked softly.

Harry didn’t answer immediately. He was experiencing a strange feeling of suspension, as though gravity had abandoned him. Then he breathed, coming back to himself, and said, “No. Hogwarts telescopes weren’t nearly as powerful as this one.”

“Of course not. Those are just tools to teach a curriculum. _This_ was built by Arcturus Black the First, who dedicated his life to astronomy.”

They spent the night looking at celestial bodies, and just as the sky lightened to a deep dark blue in preparation for the flush of dawn, lay down together on one of the platforms to attempt sleep. Harry took off his glasses and conjured a blanket to cover them both.

“It’s your birthday soon,” Draco offered. “Next week.”

“Yeah,” Harry said unenthusiastically.

“We can be rid of the Trace.”

“Yeah.”

“Potter.”

“Yeah?”

“Harry.”

“What? I’m listening.”

Draco pushed himself upward, leaned over. The stars beyond were too distant to shine light on his expression. There was only a faint glint on his eyelashes, a silver brushing along the line of his jaw, a suggestion of movement as he licked his lips. He touched Harry’s face, smoothed tenderly aside the messy fringe, traced the outline of the scar.

“Harry,” he said again.

Harry pulled him down and kissed him. From Draco there came only a shallow intake of breath. His lower lip was slightly chapped; Harry had seen him biting it throughout the day. Harry kissed him again, and then again, and again, until Draco kissed back. It was a small kiss; they were all small kisses, tight with control, but the heat of each kiss was in the rest of their bodies, which trembled. It was a force in the air, like the coming sunrise. Harry felt at his core that he was turning on his axis into something promised and inevitable, energising and languid at once. Warming. Wondrous.

Except he was not the horizon, falling to meet the sun. He was only a person, with another person, and moments of perfect clarity always passed. He mouthed a trail of kisses down Draco’s neck, and, forgetting himself, pushed a hand into Draco’s robes. Draco responded — he felt Draco respond, and both of them moaned, and brought their mouths together to kiss harder — but in the space between one kiss and the next Draco pulled back. He pulled back, and he said, “Harry, stop.”

Harry stopped. The floor pressed against the back of his skull. He took away his hands and reached with his words: “I want to.”

“I know,” Draco said. He sat up, shedding a layer of shadow. His eyes were closed. His mouth was slightly open and wet. Harry stared, committing the sight to memory.

“I think I’m going crazy,” Draco announced after about a minute.

“_You_ think you’re going crazy,” Harry muttered with a touch of derision. And then, entreating, “Will you lie back down?”

Once they were both under the blanket again, Harry sought for and found Draco’s wrist and held it. He turned on his side toward the warmth and pushed away from the shore of consciousness. It was still that simple.

When they got up a couple of hours later with sore backs from dozing on hard ground, Draco’s lips were still faintly red with kisses in the light of day.

“Stop staring, Potter,” he said, as if this was perfectly normal. “Yours aren’t any better. Hurry up, we’d better leave before the observatory closes.”

Harry sort of wanted to punch him, except he didn’t, not at all, and then he tried to convince himself that maybe what he really wanted was breakfast and to fall asleep properly in a real bed, which seemed reasonable enough, so he went to avail himself of both. Take the easy things, he thought to himself, and forget the rest that was out of reach. Except even sleep was not easy: he tossed and turned on the sheets, mind buzzing, and awoke yawning to the muted light of late afternoon feeling disorientated and more exhausted than before.

He showered and went out into the sitting room. Draco was there on the couch facing Walburga’s and Estelle’s portraits, both empty. One look at him told Harry that he had not slept; his eyes were shadowed and pink-rimmed with fatigue. His mouth was set in a downward curve of misery.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” was the first thing he said, as he noticed Harry’s entrance. “I won’t do it again.”

“Won’t you?” Harry said lightly, wondering at the sudden change of attitude from that morning, and when Draco only looked more morose amended, “Draco, it’s okay.”

“It’s really not.” Draco put his head into his hands and dragged them over the skin of his face. “I’m a mess. I keep thinking, thinking what if —“ He twisted his mouth viciously, as if what he had been about to say had a bitter taste.

Harry went and sat next to him. “What if?”

Draco glanced at him almost pleadingly. But he said only, “I need to sort myself out.”

“So you keep saying,” Harry said, and sighed.

“I was speaking to Great Aunt Walburga,” Draco revealed, as if that were somehow relevant, as if he had not changed the subject completely.

Harry waited. When the silence stretched, he prompted, “And?”

“And. She said that Estelle hadn’t visited overnight,” came the reply, but the tone was distracted.

Frowning, Harry said, “Draco, you need to sleep. Go on. If you’re worried about the painting, I can watch it. Maybe it’s best if we alternated a watch from now on.”

“Yeah,” Draco agreed tiredly. “Maybe it is.”

***

The footprints appeared the day before Harry’s birthday.

As agreed upon, they began alternating watches to keep an eye on Estelle’s painting without break. It was like staking out the pawn shop all over again, save that this time there was no guilt over intruding on someone else’s home. Still, the lack of real activity crushed their spirits further. When Harry was on watch he was so bored he was in constant danger of dozing, and when it was his turn to sleep he was restless and full of anxiety. Draco did not seem to be faring any better; his panda eyes were darker and his skin greyer each time they switched roles.

About three days into this, he said, as Harry came to take vigil, “I thought I heard someone moving around outside. Was it you?”

“No.” Harry peered at him with concern. He put a hand on Draco’s forehead, then touched his own to check the difference in temperature. There didn’t seem to be any. Draco let him do it with a long-suffering expression. “I was in bed, sleeping the whole time. What did it sound like?”

“I don’t know,” replied Draco hazily. “Tapping? Maybe? And I thought I heard Mother calling me.”

Harry considered this. “Narcissa does have access. Perhaps it was her.”

“Why would it be?” Draco questioned. “She would just come in, instead of skulking around outside.”

Harry furrowed his brows. “Well …”

“Or it could be that I’m hallucinating,” Draco allowed reluctantly. “All right, whatever. I’m going to bed. I made pasta. Have some, okay?”

It continued. Harry never heard anything other than the howling of the wind and the roar of the sea, but each time they switched places Draco complained that there’d been strange noises. Always the most concerning was his claim that there was a woman’s voice, just outside, and that the voice sounded like his mother. Harry went more than once to open the front door and settle the issue, but there was never anything there. Yet somehow the lack of evidence made it worse. Harry’s paranoia grew, to the point where he found himself straining his hearing and jumping at the slightest unexpected noise, like the sounds of his own body and the cries of sea birds.

By the time the footprints appeared, he was quite ready to call it all off.

He’d jolted from his slouched position on the couch, unsure what had woken him. Sheepishly, he realised he’d succumbed to sleep, and rubbed at his eyes. It was stupid. Surely they did not need to do this just for the sake of catching Estelle Nott? Why could they not just watch the painting during the day, and sleep properly at night? Who cared, really, if Estelle showed up in the night and no one was there to speak to her? If she appeared once, she could appear again.

“Harry,” came Draco’s voice from behind him.

Harry leapt up. “Jesus,” he said. “Malfoy. You scared me.”

Draco ignored him. He came around the couch and picked up the painting from the table. “Harry,” he said again. “You missed her.”

“What?” Harry said, confused. But then he saw: the sand dunes, which had previously been perfectly smooth, now had a set of indents leading to and from the middle of the composition. As he stared at them, a wind started to blow across the dunes, gradually smoothing them over.

“She was here,” Draco stated unnecessarily.

“Shit,” Harry swore. “Oh, fuck.”

“_Knock knock_,” Draco cast, tapping at the canvas. Nothing happened, save that the footprints vanished some more.

Groaning, Harry sat back down.

“She saw you, at least,” said Draco. “She might be curious enough to come back.” He sat as well. “Go to bed, Potter.”

“No,” Harry said. “I don’t think I can manage sleep now.”

Draco’s voice was grumpy. “One of us has to.”

“Then I’ll sleep here.” Harry closed his eyes in demonstration. “I sleep better when you’re around, anyway. And this way you can wake me straight away if anything happens.”

He hadn’t actually expected to fall asleep, but what he’d said was truer than true: he slept much better when in Draco’s presence. The mere knowledge that Draco was there was comforting and familiar enough that it lowered whatever weak walls he had held in place, and soon he was sinking into the deep nourishing black of real rest, where the dread of the war could not follow.

He dreamed, impossibly, that he was in a cocoon, rocking back and forth. A woman was just beyond it, humming a song tunelessly. It was his mother, his mum, and he was safe. She was watching over him. She was as warm and as fearless as the sun in the sky. He reached for her, and she felt him reaching and scooped him up, taking him to see his dad, who was just like him but better and stronger and smarter. Together the three of them went on an adventure, climbing a mountain, the tallest mountain in the world, where the elder tree, Syscallon, lay in wait. And they went laughingly the entire time, his proud parents and their beloved son, up and up the mountain, then down and down into its crater. But there at the centre of the crater was not a tree but a boy, pale-haired and grey-eyed, and he smiled a smile of secrecy and said: yourself, or your companion, or the rest of the world.

Which would it be?

“Harry!” called Draco’s voice.

The room was shaking. No; Harry was being shaken. He snapped awake. “What is it?”

“Can you hear that?” Draco demanded urgently.

Harry listened. Thunder rumbled.

“It’s my mother,” Draco said. “I think she’s in trouble, I need to go to her.”

“Wait,” Harry said, putting his hand on Draco’s arm. He fumbled for his wand. “_Tempus_.”

It was after midnight. Harry was seventeen.

“She sounds like she’s in pain,” Draco said insistently. “Harry, she’s just outside on the cliff. I’m going to go get her, okay?”

“Draco.” He tightened his grip. “Draco, I don’t hear anything.”

Draco looked absolutely terrible; he was as pale as a ghost and almost as cold, despite the humid warmth of the room. He said, “She’s hard to hear over the storm. Harry, even if I’m wrong, I have to go and check.”

“Okay, Draco,” Harry said measuredly, thinking fast. “I’ll come with you. Just wait one second. I want you to drink something. _Accio vial of Felix Felicis_.”

Draco nodded, but as Harry let go of his arm to catch the liquid luck, he shot up to his feet, wide-eyed. He held a finger to his mouth and cocked his head, listening, and then bolted for the door.

“Wait!” Harry yelled after him, but it was too late. Draco slammed open the door and vanished into the rain.

There wasn’t anything for it. He’d been saving Felix for an emergency, and this felt like an emergency. There was only one drop, anyway, not enough for both of them. He uncapped the vial and drank it down.

Instantly, a strange chilling heat that had nothing to do with the temperature surged through him. He knew immediately that he had done the right thing. And he knew what he should do next. “_Accio backpack_.” Estelle’s painting was empty, the footprints gone. He spared it little more than a cursory examination before picking it up and stuffing it awkwardly into the backpack, taking out the Cloak and the box in the process. He slung the backpack over his shoulders and the Cloak over his head, and grabbed his Firebolt from its place by the door as he ran.

A tempest was raging outside. Raindrops fell like tiny stones across his cheeks. He could barely see, even after he cast an Impervius Charm on his glasses. That didn’t matter. Instinctively, he moved left, along the side of the house and towards the cliff. Draco had gone in that direction, chasing the voice of his mother outside the enclosure of Fidelius. Quietly, Felix cautioned. Don’t betray your presence.

He saw Draco the same moment he saw Bellatrix.

She was with another Death Eater, a man whose silhouette Harry did not recognise. They were standing atop the cliff in plain sight; the flash of lightning revealed them starkly. This did not seem to concern them.

Harry could see why: Draco had lit his wand with _Lumos_, and was searching along the edge of the cliff, completely blind to Bellatrix’s presence. The wind carried his shout of “Mother!” and Harry’s heart thudded once, twice, in his throat.

And then there was no more time to be shocked. Felix urged him onward; he sprinted. Draco was under some sort of spell, an enchantment they had set on him to lure him out of the house. That much was evident. Even as Harry charged towards them, invisible, Bellatrix stepped forward to Draco and said over the thunder, “Here, darling, here I am!”

“Mother,” Draco cried in relief, stumbling towards her.

_Sectumsempra_, Harry thought savagely, swiping his wand. It caught Bellatrix on her back; she fell to the ground. Draco screamed.

Bellatrix screamed as well, but in the next second it became high-pitched laughter. As she stood up Harry saw the glinting remains of a spelled shield fall from around her and knew that it had caught the worst of the damage. “Baby came out to join us,” she said. “Rodolphus, there wasn’t any need for this one after all.” And turning she slashed a spell towards Draco, who was a bright beacon with his lit wand.

No defensive spell would reach to block it in time, Felix whispered, and Harry flung _Levicorpus_ instead. Draco was hurled into the air; Bellatrix’s curse missed by a hair’s breadth.

Harry was skidding into place by Draco’s side even as he let Draco drop back onto the ground. He slapped Draco hard across the cheek, hoping to break the enchantment, then grabbed Draco’s wand hand and thought, _Nox_.

“Harry?” Draco whispered.

“Shh,” Harry told him, and, bringing his nerves back into control, focused his thoughts and tried to apparate.

It didn’t work. There was a jinx in place, and in this darkness there was no hope of him finding the runes they would have used as anchor. So, Felix told him, the Firebolt. Its grip was slick with rain.

“Potter, dear Potter,” sang Bellatrix.

They had stayed in one place for too long, even though only seconds had passed. Harry grabbed Draco around the waist and rolled them both together further down towards the edge, just as another two curses flew through the empty space where they had been.

“Harry?” Draco said again as Harry righted them.

“It’s Bellatrix,” Harry said into his ear. “We need to leave. Even if the Fidelius holds, we can’t stay here and still —“

“Mother’s here,” Draco insisted. “She’s calling for me.”

So he hadn’t broken the spell. Fleetingly he thought of the matches Scrimgeour had given him, but no, that would give their position away too quickly, and might not hold reliably in the storm. “Draco, she’s not. Try to remember what you said to me before: why would Narcissa skulk around out here?” He took the Cloak off himself and put it on Draco instead, tying it securely around his neck. “Hush now. Climb up behind me and grab on. We’re going to fly.” Draco swung his leg over the broomstick slowly, unwillingly.

“Come out, come out wherever you are,” said Bellatrix delightedly. Harry tensed. She did not sound like she was far away.

Lightning flashed. Except it wasn’t lightning. Harry squinted against the sudden brightness. The other Death Eater, Rodolphus, had cast _Lumos Maxima_.

“There you are!” exclaimed Bellatrix. Her teeth were bared in the manner of a predator anticipating meat. “_Rakshacleus_.”

Harry kicked off from the ground. Bellatrix’s spell hit the grass where he had just been and melted the ground there, but he did not have the luxury to examine the effects closer; he hadn’t quite managed to mount properly, and so the angle of launch was clumsy. This was further exacerbated by the extra weight of Draco’s body. The Firebolt had never been designed to carry two people, and it showed; their ascent was ungainly and not nearly as swift as he had hoped. But they’d made it, they were in the air. He let them go higher and higher, reaching into his pocket for the box. He only needed to —

“_Sessagaseysgar_.”

The curse that flew towards them came on a jagged course, sawing its way through the air. He could not predict where it would land, but: down, commanded the Felix in his veins, and he obeyed, diving. The curse missed.

“Fool,” screeched Bellatrix at Rodolphus. “Not like that. Like _this_.” And the same curse flew out of her wand, cutting an even more violent path than the previous one.

“Fuck,” Harry breathed. If he had been alone, he could have pulled out of the dive easily. But with Draco —

Abruptly, a cold hook of realisation caught at his belly. Where was Draco? The Firebolt felt far too light.

Above, the luck whispered. Right above. Draco’s grip had loosened when Harry had dived. Since Harry had plunged down faster than Draco could fall, he’d left Draco behind. But now that Harry was flattening his descent, Draco was rapidly catching up. With the Cloak billowing upward, he was partially visible.

Get under him, said a voice in Harry’s head, and he wasn’t sure if it was his own desperate plea or Felix. Get under him. Pull upward. Catch him. _Push him away_.

The problem with liquid luck, Harry realised, was that it did not bestow godhood. Even if he knew what to do, he could not do it if it were physically impossible. He’d seen and understood the situation in a fraction of a second, but there was not enough time to react.

The curse passed over Harry’s head and hit Draco full on the chest.

One second later, Harry caught him. His body folded across the back of the Firebolt limply.

Two seconds later, Harry threw the box of Instant Peruvian Darkness Powder.

Four seconds later, Bellatrix fired another curse, but it arced wide.

Ten seconds later, the sound of her thwarted shrieks began to fade.

“Draco,” Harry said. “Draco?”

There was no answer. Harry slowed.

Don’t stop, Felix suggested.

“Shut up,” Harry growled, but knew that the assessment was correct: he could not stop. He’d flown out in the direction of the ocean instead of following the coastline, knowing that the runic anchors for the Anti-Apparition Jinx could not stretch that far over moving water. This also meant that he’d flown into the storm, and it was all he could do to keep his seat one-handed, while also keeping hold of a fistful of cloth from Draco’s back, bracing him in place.

Far enough now, Felix said. Apparate.

He didn’t want to apparate until he knew what was wrong with Draco. What if apparating made it worse? But once again, the logic flowed through him relentlessly — whatever was wrong with Draco needed professional help, and the likeliest place he would get that was Hogwarts. Thus, the quickest route to Hogwarts was also the surest.

Terrified, he shifted his hand so that he had hold of Draco’s arm instead, and even as Draco’s body began to slip, he apparated.

He snapped back into being in the air just on the edge of Hogsmeade, where he guessed the boundaries of Hogwarts’ own Anti-Apparition Jinx began. It was not raining here; the sky was cloudless, graced by a fingernail moon. Behind him, Draco was still slipping; Harry righted him just in time. As he did so, he smelled the metallic tang of blood, and felt the stickiness on his fingers.

Draco was bleeding. Bleeding badly.

Harry had never flown so desperately in all his life.

The lights of Hogwarts shown merrily with welcome, but he looked at them only with cold calculation as he approached. He could not penetrate the wards; he needed to be let in. House-elves could apparate within at will. Should he summon Kreacher? But Kreacher could not come to him while he was airborne, and Kreacher did not belong to Hogwarts. With the changes to the castle, he couldn’t be certain that Kreacher would have access. Could he summon another elf? Who? How? He shook the thoughts away. Another route. Try another route. The last time he was here, he’d been told that there were patrols. Where were they?

His Seeker eyes caught movement. Two people on brooms far to the left of Ravenclaw Tower, one high and one low, skimming the perimeter of the wards. He shot towards them.

He didn’t know the girl whose course he halted. She yelped and just managed to brake in time. He looked her over. She was in Muggle clothes, but a golden pin in the shape of a lion on her lapel told him that she was likely a Gryffindor. That was good. Gryffindors were supposed to save people.

“Take me into the castle,” he growled at her. “Now.”

“Oh my god,” she said, panicking and not heeding him. Her gaze travelled from his face to Draco. Whatever she saw there ironed horror into her expression. “Ginny!” she shouted. “Ginny, over here.”

The flier below them surged upward at her cry. “Jules,” came Ginny’s annoyed voice, “you’re supposed to use your wand to call for — _fuck_. Harry, is that you? Merlin, what happened?”

“Ginny,” Harry hissed at her, not caring how he sounded. “Get me into the castle _now_.”

“Okay,” she said shakily, and miraculously did not waste any more time. She put her hand on his shoulder. “Fly in with me. Not too fast until we’re past the middle layer. The wards will let you through as long as you maintain contact with me and give them time to react.” She, too, had a lion pin, and as they moved she tapped it with her wand and murmured a spell. Harry felt the wards react. “We’re aiming for the Astronomy Tower; that’s the control base for aerial patrols.” To the other Gryffindor she said, “Go ahead of us, Jules. Get Madam Pomfrey. Quick.”

He counted the seconds as they flew, and Ginny thankfully was silent. Still, when they finally reached the open ledge to land and he tried to recall his count, the only thing he knew was that it had been too many. He slid off the broom while he was still two metres up, paying no mind to the jolt it sent through his legs, and reached for Draco, bracing against his weight, sinking to the floor with it.

The Cloak had come askew in the flight; he untied it and pulled it off. Felix, now just a fading sensation, made him bundle it safely into the backpack.

Back in June, Draco had hit Bellatrix with a blood curse. She’d repaid the favour.

Draco’s face had no lacerations, but it was covered in red. The blood was coming from his ears, his eyes, his nose, his mouth, and, mostly disturbingly, the pores of his skin itself. That the flow of it seemed sluggish did not console Harry; it might have merely meant that Draco had lost enough that it could no longer gush forward.

“Here,” someone said, pushing at him.

Harry jerked away, and knew then that the Felix Felicis had left him completely. The person who had touched him was Madam Pomfrey. She held a potion.

“Idiot boy,” she rebuked. “Hold him steady. He needs to drink this.”

Wordlessly, Harry shifted position to support Draco’s head. The potion went down thickly, but Draco didn’t even choke. Perhaps because, Harry thought treacherously, he no longer hand the energy.

“Good,” Pomfrey said, as the last of the potion went down. “Now put him on the stretcher, Mr Potter, so that I may take him to the hospital wing.”

Harry did as instructed. Bereft of Felix, he felt suddenly sloth-like. “I’m coming as well.”

“Of course you are,” said Pomfrey, not unkindly. “Keep up, now.”

There were other people in the tower: students of various Houses, all come to see the source of the ruckus. He was too tired to look closely at them to see if he recognised any. They didn’t matter. Only Draco mattered.

“It’s not far,” Pomfrey said to him as they jogged down the stairs.

Harry assumed that she was lying to make him feel better, because he knew that the hopsital wing was nowhere near the Astronomy Tower, but as it turned out, Pomfrey had spoken truthfully. Hogwarts had done much rearranging of its innards in his absence, and they entered the hospital wing through a door on the seventh floor corridor.

“There’s an entrance on every level now,” Pomfrey explained, seeing his confusion. “The main entry is still on the first floor, but the castle is willing to allow exceptions in the case of emergencies.”

Many of the beds had privacy screens up, but a few were unoccupied. Pomfrey directed the stretcher to the nearest vacancy and lifted Draco onto it with a spell. On the opposite side of the room, a door that had previously not existed suddenly opened. Snape strode through, making a beeline for them.

“Status,” he barked.

“I’ve given him a Blood-Replenishing Potion,” Pomfrey said, while at the same time Harry said, “It was a blood curse.”

Snape sneered. “That much is evident, Potter. The incantation, was there a verbal incantation?”

Harry thought frantically. “Sessasega-something. Not of Latin base.”

Pomfrey nodded. “Shall I give him Oak’s Amber and diluted Wine of Marobisa?” she checked with Snape.

“Yes,” Snape confirmed shortly. “I’ll be back.” And he turned as quickly as he had come and went back out the same door. Harry caught a glimpse of dungeon walls before it closed.

Draco’s blood had soaked completely through his robes; now it was soaking into the bedsheets. The scent of it was overpowering and sickening. Harry breathed it in and felt mired in futility.

“Lift him up again,” said Pomfrey brusquely. She’d returned with more flasks of liquid; he’d barely registered her absence.

He did as she asked. The potions went down smoothly. The flow of blood didn’t stop.

“The Oak’s Amber will strengthen him,” Pomfrey assured him, “and the Marobisa will safely slow the pumping of his heart. It’ll be all right, Mr Potter.”

Another door opened. Harry looked up, a spark of hope flaring, but it wasn’t Snape; it was Hermione, with Ron and Ginny behind her.

Hermione was saying over her shoulder, “Yes, but there’s procedure, and if we don’t follow it then who knows when —“

Ginny talked over her. “I recognised him immediately, Hermione. It couldn’t have been anyone else.”

“But Polyjuice —“ Hermione began to argue, and stopped short as she took in the scene.

All three of them saw at the same time. Ron and Hermione blanched. Ginny’s expression hardened.

“Oh Harry,” Hermione said, coming to his side.

She didn’t ask him if he was okay. For that, he was grateful. Instead, she put her hand on his cheek, as light as a butterfly, and met his eyes. Whatever she saw there seemed answer enough for her.

It was Ron who spoke. “Harry. Is there anything we can do for you?”

“No,” Harry said, then tried again: “No, not right now. Later, maybe.”

“Okay,” Hermione said. “Okay. Later. We’ll — we wanted to see you. But we’ll leave you alone for now.”

He didn’t watch them go. Draco’s breaths were too shallow.

It was an age before Snape finally returned. He burst into the room with his customary scowl and without preamble shoved Harry aside and poured yet another potion into Draco’s mouth. This done, he placed a different flask on the bedside table, saying, “In another six hours, have him drink that. Cast no spells upon his person in the meantime.”

“Of course,” Pomfrey replied.

“Did you hear what I said, Potter?” Snape drawled.

Harry gasped. He touched a finger to the corner of Draco’s eye, where the constant welling of blood had been the most obvious. “It’s stopped.”

“You have such a penchant for the obvious,” Snape said. “I wonder if you’ll ever grow out of it.”

Harry looked at him. “Thank you, Professor.”

Snape’s scowl deepened. “Don’t you dare thank me, Potter. I would sooner perish than tolerate your gratitude. Draco Malfoy is one of the most promising minds to ever grace these halls; his only misfortune is to have you for a friend.” His dark eyes pinned Harry to the floor. “In that you are exactly like your father: you take what is brightest and put it in harm’s way.”

At any other time, Harry might have shouldered such comments with dignity, or even brushed them aside. Now, however, they pierced him and struck true.

“Severus,” said Pomfrey disapprovingly.

“I know,” Harry admitted, squeezing the words out with difficulty. “I know. You’re right. The curse was meant for me. It should have hit me.” He thought of Sirius. “Always, it should have hit me, and didn’t.”

“Your father was the type to be uselessly sorry after the fact, too,” Snape said. “You —“

“Really, Severus,” interjected Pomfrey, putting her hands on her hips. “The boy isn’t his father. This is neither the time nor the place.”

Silence. Then: “I forgot myself, Madam Pomfrey. I’ll return to my business.”

“Thank you,” Pomfrey replied stiffly. Snape swept out. She waited until the door had sunk back into the stone seamlessly before saying, “Now, Mr Potter. I shall need to help my patient wash off the blood. I imagine you would like to freshen up, too. The prefect baths are still in the same location.”

“No,” Harry said. “I’ll wash him.”

Pomfrey looked at him dubiously. “No spells must be cast on him, Mr Potter, and moving him somewhere more convenient while he heals is out of the question. You’d have to wipe him down with a damp cloth manually, and _Scourgify_ the sheets beneath him after. It will be quite physically taxing. You are already tired, and you should rest.”

Harry thought of Draco, picking glass out of Harry’s skin. “I can do it.”

Pomfrey continued to frown at him sternly, but he could see that she had relented. “Very well.” She waved her wand. “_Accio basin_. _Accio towels_. _Accio patient’s robes_.” The items deposited themselves neatly on the table next to Snape’s potion. “You know the spell to warm water to body temperature?”

“Yes.”

“I will be in my office if you need me, Mr Potter.”

At her departure, he drew closed the privacy curtains and set to work. He cleaned Draco’s face first. The blood had caked especially thick above his lips, around his eyes and in the helix of his ears. His hair, too, was congealed together in dark red and brown lumps. Harry didn’t know how many times he emptied the basin and re-conjured the water before it remained semi-clear after he wrung out the towel. Even then, he had not managed to get all the blood covering Draco’s scalp around the roots of his hair. He let it be and moved on to the rest of Draco’s body. Dried blood flaked off the robes as he removed them. Once they were off, he Vanished them.

Pomfrey had been right; it was physically taxing. The repetitive task of bending to the water and then bending to Draco wore at his muscles and drenched him in sweat. He was glad to do it. It taught him something: he had never known just how heavy a limb could be when the owner of it lent no strength to its lifting. How had he never appreciated just how magical and yet mundane a body was, how graceful when well carried and conscious, how untidy when it was not? He cleaned the blood from between Draco’s fingers and almost fell into distraction marvelling at their structure, the exact same and yet completely different from his own.

He had just cast _Scourgify_ on the sheets and was preparing to dress Draco in the clean robes when Draco made a noise and said, “Harry?”

“I’m here,” Harry said at once.

Draco blinked blearily up at the ceiling. His gaze was unfocused.

“We’re at Hogwarts,” Harry told him. He put his arm under Draco’s back and lifted him up, then guided Draco’s hand through the sleeve of the robe.

“Can’t move,” Draco mumbled.

“You lost a lot of blood.” It was an effort to pull the robe around, but he managed it, and wove through Draco’s other arm. That done, he tugged it all into proper shape and tied it closed.

“Mother,” said Draco. It was question.

“Narcissa wasn’t there.” Harry settled a blanket around his shoulders. “It was a trick by Bellatrix,” he clarified, but Draco’s eyes were already drifting shut again.

Harry checked the time, conjured a chair, and sat down to wait.

***

He was still there in the same position when Pansy came to visit around lunchtime. Sleep had eluded him, but he had kept a close eye on the time and given Draco the additional potion on the minute exactly, and it had had a noticeably positive effect. Pomfrey had been pleased when she had come to check Draco’s progress.

Pansy arrived in high dudgeon; she opened the privacy curtains quietly enough, but he saw the anger in her rigid posture all the same.

She wasn’t angry at him. At the sight of him her expression softened and she said soothingly, “Harry, darling,” and kissed him as she liked to on the corner of his mouth. Then she turned to Draco and placed her forehead on his, as if to reassure herself of his physicality. “I didn’t hear until just now.”

He touched her elbow. She straightened and put her arm around his shoulders.

“I was so afraid, Pansy,” he confessed, because he had to tell someone.

“Yes,” she only said. “I would have been, too.”

He prepared himself to say more, but heard a door opening. A few moments later, the curtains slid sideways again to reveal Hermione and Ron. Ron carried a plate of food.

“Ah, Hermione,” Pansy said acerbically. “Thank you for informing me so swiftly this afternoon about this particular situation. I do so love being kept up to date on the wellbeing of my dearest friends.”

“Pansy,” Hermione said, and to Harry’s surprise she actually appeared chastised. “I see the message I sent was delayed.”

“Delayed,” Pansy repeated. “Delayed? By the time your messenger caught me, I was already en route; I had to find out from _rumours_.”

“I didn’t think it appropriate to wake you in the middle of the night.”

“Hermione,” Pansy said, in a way that suggested she was barely holding the syllables together, “you should know that it is my express wish to be woken up at any hour of any day if the news concerns my own.”

Whatever solicitude Hermione had managed to dredge up evaporated. She glared. “Fine.”

“Excellent,” Pansy said.

“Harry, mate, you hungry?” Ron asked. He offered forth his plate.

Harry had thought that he wasn’t, but the smell of the food changed his mind. “Yeah. Thanks, Ron.”

“No problem.”

“Once you’ve eaten,” Hermione said matter-of-factly, “I want to know what happened. We need to exchange information.” She took out her wand and cast a series of spells for privacy.

Harry glanced at Pansy.

“Pansy knows about You-Know-What,” Hermione informed him. “I made the decision to tell her. She’s been crucial in our gathering of information.”

“Absolutely crucial,” Pansy agreed, her tone caught between sarcastic and prideful. “Although, I think Hermione only looped me in because she was getting overwhelmed.” She leaned her head down to Harry’s and added in a stage whisper, “She has over half the castle reporting to her, I think she’s trying to take over McGonagall’s job.”

Harry swallowed a bite of bread. “Where is McGonagall, anyway?”

“She was called away a few days ago to discuss the foreign aid issue with the French,” replied Hermione. “Scrimgeour is still missing, presumed dead, and it’s fallen to her to act as a de facto liaison. Believe me, it’s not ideal.” She went on, “Harry, we’ve been working on Slughorn, but he won’t budge. The closest we’ve gotten is the acknowledgement that seven is a magical number, which is barely any help at all.”

“I disagree,” said Pansy. “I was the one who had that conversation with him, and the way he hedged around it was revealing enough. I _know_ how to dig out people’s secrets. It’s seven.”

“Are you willing to bet your life on it?” Hermione challenged. “I wish I had your certainty.” She sighed. “There’s slightly better news in regards to Hufflepuff’s cup. A few weeks ago, Rodolphus Lestrange accessed his family vault at Gringotts, and made a withdrawal. He killed a goblin while he did it; now they all want his head on a spike. That’s public knowledge. What we found out in private through Ron’s brother Bill was that the withdrawal was for one item of high historical value. Beyond that, the goblins refuse to confirm or deny.”

“In spite of their best interests,” added Ron.

“They have their own value system to follow,” chided Hermione.

“Draco’s mother was tailing Lestrange that day,” Pansy said. “According to her, he went straight to Malfoy Manor.”

“In other words,” Hermione summarised, “we think it’s likely that You-Know-Who now keeps the cup by his side, along with his snake.”

“He could have also hidden it on the grounds,” said Draco’s voice.

He was awake, staring at them. Harry moved closer and clasped his hand. “Draco.”

“I’m fine, Potter, stop that. Help me sit up. Give me some of that food.” His voice had no energy, but there was colour in his cheeks. Harry did as he asked. Draco picked up a piece of toast with a queasy expression. “Tell me about last night. I can only recall fragments. Mother wasn’t there?”

“Bellatrix had you under some spell. She was pretending to be Narcissa, to lure you out.”

“No doubt so that I could lead her into the house, to you,” Draco deduced. “I should have been more careful.”

“We both hadn’t been sleeping well, Draco.”

“No, I mean that I should have guessed Fidelius would backfire on us. Aunt Bellatrix knew about that property, and she would have noticed that knowledge of its whereabouts was suddenly missing from her memory, once she recovered enough from her time in Azkaban. Mother even said that she had been seen around the area months ago. Remember? I bet they tried the same trick at Grimmauld Place as well, but luckily for us we weren’t there, and whatever spell they used must be attuned to one specific person, given that it didn’t ensnare you.” Drained by the effort of speaking so much, he drew a long breath and stilled himself, eyes closing again momentarily. Then he turned to Pansy. “I presume these Gryffindors have told you about Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place?”

She smiled at him. “We’ve been using it as a base of operations for intelligence gathering. Which, by the way, is a very satisfying phrase to say. I meet with your mother there, sometimes.”

“My mother,” Draco echoed. “How is my mother?”

“I saw her two days ago, Draco,” Pansy said. “She’s well. She’s the source of a great deal of our information on Death Eater movement, and she’s kept in contact with a lot of the families that have fled overseas. Some of them have been aiding us with supplies.”

A great pressure seemed to lift from Draco’s shoulders. He visibly relaxed. “That’s good.”

“Excuse me,” said Hermione. “Harry. What is this about Bellatrix pretending to be Narcissa?”

“All right, well,” Harry said, “since Malfoy’s stolen the rest of my food, I suppose it’s my turn to talk.” He gave a brief account of the search for the locket, glossing over much of the beginning and the time spent in Privet Drive, instead speeding ahead to Theo’s memories and their efforts with the painting, concluding with: “Meanwhile, Bellatrix tracked us down and tried to lure Draco out. We managed to escape.”

“You know, Harry,” Ron commented, “whenever you describe a series of events, I always get the feeling I’m only getting a synopsis from someone who wasn’t even there.”

Harry shrugged. “There’s no point in embellishments.”

“Yeah but,” Ron complained, “it sounds like a shopping list.”

“Get Malfoy to tell you if you want the deluxe edition with bells and whistles.”

“I’ll save you the trouble of asking, Weasley,” Draco said, brushing crumbs off his fingers. He was making only small movements, as though just the act of chewing was exhausting. “The answer is no. I’m no one’s minstrel for hire. Especially not yours.”

“I’d rather listen to a choir of screaming banshees than you, Malfoy, don’t you bloody worry.”

“Never mind that,” Hermione said impatiently. “Where is this portrait of Estelle Nott? She knows where the locket is?”

“We think she might,” Harry said. “And the painting is right here.” He stooped down to recover the backpack from where he had shoved it under the bed.

He put the painting on top of the sheets. They all crowded around to look. The sand dunes were the same as ever.

“Right,” said Ron slowly after a long silence. “So … let me get this straight. You want this crazy woman in this painting to come into the frame so you can ask her if her son happened to tell her where he might have buried something in a nondescript part of a forest somewhere? Is that correct?”

“Well, yes,” Harry said. “Look, I know it sounds ridiculous, but it’s all we’ve got.”

“Okay, but if you’ve seen this forest in a memory and know what it looks like, why can’t you just apparate there?”

Harry and Draco shared a look. “Ron,” Harry said, “you can’t apparate to a place you’ve never been to before.”

“Yeah you can,” Ron contradicted. “People do it all the time. When Charlie took his test the first time he ended up five miles off from where he was supposed to go, and he’d definitely never been there before.”

“But he did that accidentally. He was trying to get to someplace else.”

Hermione cleared her throat. “Actually, Ron is right. You _can_ apparate to a destination you have no prior experience of.”

Ron’s grin nearly split his face. “Ha!” he crowed. “Hear that? I’m right.”

“You’re right in the technical sense, but Harry has the right _idea_,” Hermione clarified.

“Oh,” Ron said, wilting.

“It’s like this,” Hermione continued, her voice taking on that cadence it always did when she was preparing to lecture on a subject. “Apparition is the transportation of the self and all the self encompasses from point A to point B. Modern lessons for apparition usually focus on the three D’s, that is, Destination, Determination, and Deliberation, because it was found that that was the safest way to teach it to prevent Splinching. But in the past, apparition used to be taught based only on the principles of Direction and Distance. For instance: a witch might be placed on a straight road and told to apparate so-and-so distance down the road, further north. Even if the witch was unfamiliar with the road, the destination is clear. Does that make sense?”

“Er,” Harry said. “Yes?”

“So therefore…?” she prompted.

“Therefore,” Draco said, “we cannot apparate to the place in Nott’s memory, because we have no understanding of which way it lies relative to our current position, nor any clue as to how far away it is. I thought you knew this, Potter.”

“I did,” Harry protested indignantly. When Draco only stared at him incredulously, he added, “Not in so many words.”

Draco’s lips quirked into a smirk. “Because you’re such a shopping list?”

“Oi,” Ron said.

“_Anyway_,” Hermione said. “Now that we’ve established that, we need to put our minds to the real problem.”

“Wait,” Pansy interrupted. “I have a question. Would this not all be easier if we asked Theo instead? Harry’s reasoning was a bit confusing. Why can’t we get Theo?”

Harry and Draco shared another look. Harry cocked his head. Draco glowered.

“It’s really annoying when the two of you do that,” said Ron.

“Deal with it, Weasley,” Draco retorted. To Pansy, he said, “We don’t know where Theo is, and we — I think it might endanger him. Unless you’ve heard anything that might help?”

Pansy shook her head. “I’ve had reports of Theo’s father, but not of Theo. I thought maybe he’d gone into hiding.”

“What do the reports of Theo’s father say?” Harry asked curiously.

Frowning with thought, Pansy recounted, “He’s been visiting pureblood families, old clients, trying to turn them to the Dark Lord’s cause. And not just locally, either. Selwyn-Hester said that he had called on their estate in Vienna. Other than that, he’s been sighted once in a Muggle area. Do the two of you know about the Oxford fires?”

“No,” Harry answered. “We’ve been too isolated.”

“A bunch of buildings in Muggle Oxford burnt down,” Pansy said. “The fire was already gone by the time we heard and sent help.” She nodded at Hermione. “Hermione suspects controlled Fiendfyre; it would fit with how quickly the buildings were annihilated. One of the survivors was an eight year old Muggleborn boy. Cedric Diggory found him. He was screaming in the rubble, underage magic flinging chunks of debris everywhere. Not even old enough to get his Hogwarts letter. He has a little sister, maybe four or five, who has no magic. We think he managed to save her, somehow.” She ran a hand through her hair, taking a deep breath. “We brought both of them to Hogwarts, and somehow Diggory managed to convince the kid to put his memories of what happened into a Pensieve. Helps with the trauma and all that. The memories are unstable, of course, but there’s a fairly clear shard of recollection where you can see Nott on the street before things go to shit.”

No one said anything for several seconds. Harry studied Pansy; he had been too preoccupied with Draco to look at her closely before. Now, in a cliché sort of way, he was expecting to see that she looked more mature, but instead she just looked sad, in the same way that he had seen her looking sad countless times before.

“Okay,” said Hermione finally. “Let’s examine our options and make a plan of action.”

“Here we go,” Pansy muttered.

Hermione ignored her. “Our options aren’t mutually exclusive. I propose that we can make headway on the portrait, Theodore Nott _and_ the cup at the same time.”

“Hang on,” Harry cut in. “When did this become ‘we,’ as in all of us here? Hermione, Draco and I were seen arriving last night. Bellatrix is after us. I don’t intend to stay.”

“And you want to drag Malfoy in his current condition to where, exactly? Your safehouse was compromised.”

“It’s me they’re after; Malfoy doesn’t have to come.”

“So help me Potter if you sneak off without me —“

“And,” Harry said, louder, “you had no objection to my going off on my own when I left in June. We agreed that You-Know-What has to be kept secret.”

“That was then, this is now,” Hermione said. “The circumstances are different. Back in June, I could not abandon what I wanted to do for Hogwarts and had no idea if it would even be successful. Now, I’ve set things up satisfactorily enough that the system will run even in my absence. As for You-Know-What, it _has_ been kept secret. Pansy was the only one I told, and I needn’t remind you that you advised me to do so at my discretion. We don’t need to divulge everything to everyone in order to make use of our resources, Harry.”

“It’s dangerous,” Harry protested obstinately.

“It’s a war,” Hermione countered. “If it’s your known presence at Hogwarts that you object to, that’s easily solved. Both you and Malfoy need only give me some of your hair, and I’ll arrange with Fred and George that the two of you are seen leaving tomorrow. Tonight, even.”

“Have you ever considered,” Pansy remarked to Ron _sotto voce_, “that Hermione Granger may be the real conqueror we need to worry about? Look at how she manages our lives.”

“Malfoy needs to recover,” said Hermione, as if Pansy hadn’t spoken. “We can put you in the Room of Requirement.”

Harry crossed his arms. “Tell me first what you mean about working on the portrait, Theo and the cup at the same time.”

“There may be methods to force the subject of a portrait back into frame,” Hermione said. “So, research. Next, Theodore. If he’s missing, he can be found. And if he can’t be found anywhere else, then perhaps he’s being held at Malfoy Manor. Worst case, we can try tracking him with an owl if he hasn’t warded against them. Or we could use the modified Patronus Charm, which might be more reliable.”

“No,” Draco objected. “I’ve considered that. If it catches him at the wrong moment, they’ll know he’s a traitor.” He added coldly, “And if the Dark Lord is given any reason to sift through Theo’s mind, that will destroy our chances with the locket. Think of that, if you don’t care about Theo himself.”

“I never said I didn’t care about him,” Hermione said evenly. “But I do see your point. This brings me to the cup. We need to recover it from Malfoy Manor, which means we’ll need to infiltrate it, somehow. While we’re there, we could look for Theodore. The portrait, after all, is a gamble. There’s no sense in pinning all our hopes on it.”

Draco sat up higher. “If the Dark Lord suspects Theo at all, he won’t care which Nott pays for it.”

“If you’re talking about Theodore’s father,” Hermione replied stonily, “he’s the one involved in the destruction of over fifty Muggle homes. At best, he stood by and agreed that it should happen. At worst, he cast the spell himself. Countless people died. Parents lost children; children became orphans. As far as I’m concerned, Aristides Nott is one of the last people whose wellbeing we should take into account when we’re making decisions that will lose or win this war. As for Theodore himself: he cannot help who his father is, anymore than you could, Malfoy, I’m sure.”

She’d said it more eloquently than Harry could have managed, and yet, as he saw the hurt flicker across Draco’s face before being quickly masked, he felt compelled to place his hand on Draco’s shoulder in a gesture of support.

Hermione noted it, and turned her attention back to him. “Well, Harry? I’ve told you what I think we should do.”

“If we infiltrate Malfoy Manor, or if we must go somewhere to retrieve the locket, you mean to come with us?”

“Not if, _when_,” Hermione corrected. “And yes, I do.”

“If Hermione’s going, so am I,” said Ron.

“Oh great,” drawled Pansy. “If all four of you are volunteering, then I’m definitely not. What? Don’t look at me like that. _I_ have no desire to put myself in the way of blood curses and who knows what else, no thank you.” She put her nose up. “If I have to be the last Slytherin to have any sense of self-preservation, then that’s a mantle I’m willing to bear.”

“Just as well,” said Hermione after a beat. “You can manage things in my absence.”

“I’m managing things in your _presence_, Hermione, be honest now,” Pansy rejoined, raising an eyebrow.

“Harry, c’mon, just say you agree,” urged Ron. “I don’t see what you even have a problem with, actually.”

What Harry had a problem with was that these people here, enclosed as they were in such a small insubstantial place, encompassed all the people who held a piece of him in some irrevocable way. He still had Draco’s blood trapped underneath his fingernails. He had learnt exactly what that felt like. He didn’t want to learn it again with a different person. He didn’t want anyone else to take a curse that was meant for him.

And yet: he had never questioned the idea that Draco would accompany him on the search for Horcruxes. Even when he had threatened to leave Draco at Hogwarts earlier, he hadn’t really meant it. He knew Draco, knew him well enough to know that he would never let Harry meet danger alone if he could help it. He’d known that since second year. It wasn’t like Draco had no sense of self-preservation. He did. Draco’s willingness to accompany Harry was born from the same reasons that had allowed Bellatrix’s enchantment to work so successfully on him. Draco would always go to save his mother. Draco would always go to save Harry. To Draco, it was the same as saving himself.

So it was his understanding of Draco that afforded Draco autonomy in Harry’s mind. He had to acknowledge that he didn’t understand Hermione or Ron in quite in the same way, to quite the same degree.

That didn’t mean he could tell them no.

Even if he did, they wouldn’t listen.

At least Pansy, he thought affectionately, had no intentions of going anywhere.

“Okay, Hermione,” he conceded. “You’d better go tell the Weasley twins that they’ll have to pretend to be me and Malfoy. I’m sure they’ll just love that.”


	27. Chapter 27

“I’m utterly incapable of functioning,” Draco whined. “It’s been an entire day; how is it that I still can’t stand without falling over?”

“Pomfrey said you need to lie still for a month,” Harry reminded him sagely.

“A month,” mused Draco. “In a month I’ll be driven insane by boredom.”

“You’ll also be recovered.”

Draco made a noise of misery.

Harry suspected that the present histrionics were just for show. Draco still looked terrible, even though he had slept for fifteen hours straight after Harry had moved him to the Room of Requirement, which was now a modest living area with decor that was slightly reminiscent of Ursa-at-Sea.

Harry was responsible for this iteration. The door from the corridor opened to a dusty broom cupboard, which in turn hid another door that led to their chambers. The second door could only be opened from the inside, and was not even visible from the cupboard until it was. Ron and Hermione had lent him use of the Marauder’s Map so that he could let in who he chose.

“It was your birthday yesterday,” Draco said suddenly.

Harry looked up from his book on wizarding portraits. “Yeah, it was.”

“Coming of age birthdays are traditionally celebrated with much extravagance.”

“We’ve never made a big deal of our birthdays,” Harry said uncomfortably.

“Yeah, because you didn’t like it when I tried to throw a party for you in first year.”

“Ah.” He’d nearly forgotten about that. “Well, I mean, my birthday is in the summer holidays, and it was weird to celebrate it early.”

“It was more than that.”

“Also, I was in the hospital wing at the time, and you caused a scene.”

“I mean that you weren’t used to that kind of attention, to all those presents.”

Harry said nothing.

“I was thinking of getting you a present,” Draco went on. “But I couldn’t think of what to get, other than a watch, and that’s no good, because there’s probably a family heirloom to that effect waiting for you in your Gringotts vault. Potter, what do you want?”

Unbidden, Harry thought of Draco in the observatory, the silhouetted certainty of each kiss, the hard floor, the stars. The rings of Saturn, which would one day disappear.

He said, “I dunno.”

“Really?”

Harry shrugged. “Nothing comes to mind. Or, look, maybe something Quidditch related. Doesn’t matter.”

“I’m very annoyed with you right now,” Draco declared.

“What’s new,” said Harry airily.

The oldest known wizarding portrait, he read, was in a private collection owned by the main branch of the Yue family in China. It was over five thousand years old, and it depicted a child of undetermined gender, standing in front of an indistinct structure. It had been painted on a material that resembled bamboo, but must have been created magically by the artist, for it had properties of high quality watercolour paper. Unfortunately, much of the ink and magic that had gone into the painting had faded with time, and most of the details were lost. Still, it was possible on some days to see the child wander into view to frolic with a flock of sparrows. The last record of the child speaking to anyone or indeed interacting with the living world was during the Tang Dynasty.

There was a picture of the painting on the next spread. A footnote said that it was a still replica, not intended to move. The sparrows were more gestural line than fully formed bird.

“Harry,” Draco said. He sounded more subdued.

Harry hummed to show that he’d heard.

“Help me to the bathroom.”

“Levitate?” Harry asked, as he had the last couple of times.

“No, I want to walk.”

The bathroom wasn’t far from the bed. Harry had asked the Room to make it that way on purpose. Still, Draco did not make it easily. The blood curse had more than simply drained him of its namesake, it had severely damaged tissue and muscle in a way which required Draco’s own magic to mend. Potions could only do so much; it wasn’t as simple as regrowing a vanished bone, or so Pomfrey had said. Whatever the case, Harry considered the estimated timeframe of a one month recovery to be more than reasonable.

He helped Draco brace himself against the bathroom wall and said, “Call me when you’re done.”

“I don’t need to piss.” Draco tottered over to the bathtub, which was a simple porcelain thing shaped in the Muggle style, less extravagant than what wizards usually preferred. He made an attempt to sit on its edge and nearly fell in. “I want a proper bath.”

“Are you sure you can manage?” Harry asked doubtfully.

“No, which is why you’re going to pull up a seat.” Draco gave a cynical laugh. “At this point in our relationship, it’s not like it could get more humiliating for me.” He tugged open his robes.

The Room, with a rather cheerful pop, produced a wooden stool next to the tub. Harry sat down and pulled Draco’s robes off the rest of the way. “You feel humiliated?”

Draco fixed him with a look, then rolled his eyes. “I certainly don’t enjoy not having physical independence, you dolt.”

“What I mean is, it’s not like you haven’t seen me — you know.”

“It’s not like I haven’t seen you similarly humiliated?” A faint smirk. “No shit, Potter. That’s exactly why this is even remotely tolerable.” He got in the tub and turned on four of the taps at the same time. Almost at once the bathroom was filled with bubbles and steam and misty rainbows. Harry hurriedly shut the door.

Draco sank fully into the water with a moan. Harry gave him to the count of thirty before hurling him back up for air.

“My body feels so much lighter,” Draco said appreciatively when he surfaced. “I’d like to sleep here from now on, instead of the bed.”

“Shove over that way a bit,” Harry instructed. “I’m going to wash your hair.” He leaned over to the low shelf and grabbed a bottle of shampoo.

“Ugh, not that one.” Draco knocked at his hand and indicated a smaller, green bottle. “That one.”

“What’s the difference?”

“What do you mean, ‘what’s the difference’?” Draco said disbelievingly, as Harry uncapped the bottle. “Why do you just put any random product in your hair?”

“Because no matter what I do to my hair it’s always like this?”

Draco shifted and regarded him with one amused eye. Harry made a face and turned Draco back around. He lathered the shampoo and ran his hands once through Draco’s already wet hair, tentative, then did it again with more confidence.

He said, “Your hair’s getting long.”

“How nice of you to notice. I’ll make an appointment with my hairdresser tomorrow.”

“I could cut it for you.”

Harry was sure Draco could not have infused his voice with any more horror. “Oh no, Potter. No you won’t.”

Gently, Harry whacked his shoulder. “It wouldn’t be _that_ bad.”

“Oh, yes it would. It absolutely would be.”

“You’re so full of melodrama, Malfoy, I swear to god.”

“If you think this is melodramatic of me, you don’t want to see what I’d be like if you actually did cut my hair.”

They were still bickering pleasantly as Harry moved on to scrubbing Draco’s back when Harry heard knocking.

He went out to the main room to check the Map, and saw that it was Ron.

“Hey,” Ron greeted as Harry let him in. “Hermione found more books on portraits for you to read.” He dumped a small tower onto the floor next to the couch.

“Brilliant,” said Harry. “I’ll let her know in a year once I’ve read through them all if I find anything useful, shall I?”

Ron chuckled. “Why are your clothes wet, by the way?”

“Er. Malfoy’s taking a bath.”

“Malfoy’s taking a bath,” Ron repeated slowly. “So your clothes are wet. Okay.”

There was definitely some misunderstanding taking place, but Harry did not know how to dispel it without revealing that Draco needed assistance for basic tasks. None of the others had been around when Pomfrey had given her diagnosis the previous morning; Ron probably only had a vague idea of Draco’s condition, and it would be better to keep it that way. So Harry just shrugged.

At this, Ron offered awkwardly, “Um, I was going to hang out for a while, but I can come back later. Pansy said she managed to get some bottles of firewhisky. She said that uh, what with what happened she forgot that it was your birthday yesterday, and wanted to make a proper toast.”

“Oh.”

“Ginny got wind of it too,” Ron added apologetically. “She knows that you’re still here — not that I told her, she figured it out from Fred and George.” He held up his hands in placation. “Said she wanted to come as well. I think she feels like it’s her duty, since she’s the one who found you.”

Harry was the one who had found _her_, but he nodded as if it all made sense.

“Great. We’ll come up after dinner. Which reminds me —“

“The house-elves have been sending food up,” Harry assured him.

“Oh, good. That solves it. We’ll see you tonight, then?”

“All right.”

Draco was floating in the water with his eyes closed when Harry returned to the bathroom.

“Did you put the idea into Pansy’s head?” he demanded, sitting back down.

“What idea?”

“Draco.” There was no way he hadn’t heard everything.

“Fine. Yes, I mentioned it to her.” With a grimace, Draco manoeuvred himself back to his previous position. “Do you mind?”

“We didn’t do anything for your birthday,” Harry grumbled.

“Because we don’t, usually, just like you said.” More quietly, he went on, “Plus, Father is dead and Mother is preoccupied, and the Manor is overrun. I’d always imagined my coming of age ceremony to be held at the Manor. Mother was going to help me with the guest list, and Father would have — it was going to be an expensive and exclusive event. If it can’t be any of those things, I’d rather it just didn’t happen.”

“Really?”

“I can still savour good firewhisky in the meantime, Potter,” said Draco haughtily. “And it’s not like this is only for _you_. Maybe I just want an excuse to get drunk.”

“I don’t think you should get drunk in your current state.”

“Yeah? Watch me.”

***

Draco got drunk. So did Harry. In fact, all of them got smashingly drunk.

It had started out well enough. Pansy, Ron and Ginny had arrived together, carrying a bottomless bag of booze (the bag was bottomless, the booze wasn’t — but Pansy assured them it was plenty). Ginny had also brought several boxes of firewhisky bon bons. They’d sat down by the hearth and made stiff conversation for half an hour until Pansy got impatient and announced that _she_ was going to start drinking, and Hermione could be as late as she wished.

Once Pansy opened the bottle and conjured the glasses, it became difficult to resist. The firewhisky smelled good and burned down his throat even better, and after his first sip he didn’t have the heart to tell Draco — who was leaning against the couch next to Pansy and actually looked relaxed — that he couldn’t have any. It was fine, anyway; they were all drinking responsibly, and all it did was make it easier to talk. Ginny told a story of how she had once hid dungbombs all around the Burrow and gotten away with it because everyone had thought it had been the twins’ fault, which enlightened Ron to the true culprit behind his ruined Chudley Cannons blanket, and the ensuing shouting match got the ball rolling.

Pansy commiserated with Ginny about brothers, revealing that she had a brother of her own, older by eleven years, who had caused her all sorts of grievances when she was younger. Harry, who knew little about Penstemon Parkinson save that he existed, listened with interest. Apparently, he had gone to the Americas a few years ago, and was neckdeep in the excavation of ancient magical ruins located on an Unplottable island in the Caribbean Sea. This triggered a discussion of relatives who had moved abroad, and it was around this time that Hermione finally joined them.

“I’m so sorry I’m late,” she said, sitting down in the empty spot next to Harry. “Goldstein wanted to switch his patrol schedule around, and then I had to check over the roster with Padma.”

“Less talk about work,” chided Pansy, tapping her wand against the last empty glass. A large block of ice materialised. Pansy poured two generous fingers. “More drinking.”

“Toast!” Ron said, raising his glass. “To Harry. Happy late birthday.”

“That’s right,” Pansy agreed. “To Harry.”

“Happy birthday, Potter.” Draco inclined his glass, not quite raising it. He probably could not, Harry thought, and nearly opened his mouth to say something, but stopped.

“Yeah, Harry, happy birthday,” Ginny joined in, smiling.

“Happy birthday, Harry,” Hermione said.

It was embarrassing, but with the firewhisky already in him, it was only a mild embarrassment. Tolerable. Enjoyable, even. They clinked their glasses together and drank.

After that, Ron proposed another toast to Hogwarts, so they drank to that as well, and Pansy held up her glass for victory in the war, and they drank to that thrice. Then Draco, for some unknown reason, toasted Penstemon Parkinson and his magical ruins. Everyone agreed that that was a fine toast, even Hermione, who asked Pansy to tell the story again and had too many sober questions about the history of the area. Thankfully, Ginny saved them by coming up with the idea of a bon bon toast — to what Harry wasn’t quite sure — but they each ate a bon bon all the same, and some of them went back for seconds. And thirds. By this point, there were already several empty bottles glinting in the firelight.

“So you went out with Michael Corner,” Pansy said to Ginny, apropos of nothing.

Actually, it might’ve been apropos of something, but Harry had momentarily lost track of the conversation.

“Yeah,” Ginny said, and threw out welcoming arm. “Ask me anything.”

“Was he a good catch? Did he have stamina?”

“Merlin’s pants,” Ron said loudly. “I don’t want to listen to this.”

Ginny burped. “Psh. Stamina. No. He was enthusiastic, though.”

Pansy leered with undisguised delight. “Any good with his tongue?”

Ginny waggled her eyebrows. “You know what? Yeah, as a matter of fact.”

“Kill me,” Ron pleaded to the ceiling.

“Why’d you dump him?” Pansy wanted to know.

“Ah, well.” Ginny stretched out her legs and took a sip of her drink. “He was really — how should I put this? Really keen.”

“That’s a bad thing?” Ron asked, then went red. “No, stop. Pretend I didn’t say anything. I inpoke, I mean invoke, my right as your brother, as your brother to not have to talk.”

“You can not talk anytime, brother,” Ginny told him, untroubled. “Be my guest.”

“That came out not right,” Ron grumbled.

Hermione said, “Too keen is no good, sometimes.”

Pansy turned to her, smirking. “Oh? Do tell.”

“Viktor.” Hermione gave a minute shrug. “He wanted me to move to Bulgaria. Had it all planned out. Right after graduation, he said. I said no. I said, are you crazy, have you thought this through at all? He said, yes I have. We broke up.”

“Hm. So that’s what happened.”

Hermione studied the glass in her hand and tossed it back. “I miss him,” she said simply.

Ron looked at her unhappily. “Do you still?”

Hermione didn’t answer. Instead, Pansy said, “Of course she does. That’s how it is when you love someone.”

“Oh, I didn’t love him,” Hermione said. “I just liked him a lot.”

Draco had slid from his upright position against the couch; he looked too tired to adjust himself. Pansy, good girl that she was, noticed and pushed his head to lean on her shoulder. Harry caught her eyes and smiled.

“Are _you_ in love with someone, then, Parkinson?” Ginny asked.

“Pansy’s in love with herself,” Draco informed the room.

“‘Scuse me,” slurred Ron. “That’s not a very nice —“ he hiccuped — “thing to say.”

But Harry saw understanding pass between Draco and Pansy. Draco knew that Pansy only liked to collect secrets, not reveal her own, and he was giving her an easy way out.

Ginny burped again. “That true, Parkinson?”

“Blow kisses to myself in the mirror every day,” Pansy said with a narcissistic simper, and drank.

“Kissing,” Ron muttered, scowling. Then his gaze focused on Harry. “Didn’t you go out with Pansy at one point?”

Harry hadn’t been aware that his — was it a fling? — with Pansy had been public enough that Ron would hear about it. “Er. Yeah?”

“He went out with Hermione, too,” Ginny said contemplatively. “The Yule Ball, you know.”

Ron’s scowl grew. “Yeah, that too.”

“Oh get over it, Ron,” Hermione said to him. “It was ages ago, and Harry’s not interested.”

“Harry’s not interested,” Ron said speculatively. “What about you?”

“I’m not either!”

Unexpectedly, Draco spoke up. “Aren’t you, Granger?”

“Oh ho,” said Pansy gleefully. She turned to Hermione. “I’ve suspected since third year that Draco was jealous of you.”

Draco was drunk enough to say, “Lay off, Parkinson.”

“Admit it, Draco, you were. Are.”

“Wait a sec,” said Ron. “Why’s, why is, why would Malfoy be jealous of Hermione?”

Pansy reached over and gave him a patient pat on the shoulder. “Weasley. You can’t be this dense. Isn’t it obvious?”

“No,” insisted Ron. “I mean, I mean aren’t Harry and Malfoy shagging? Why’s he got to be jealous?” And he hiccuped again and held a hand to his head, groaning.

Uproar. Ginny snorted into her glass and said, “They’re WHAT,” while at the same time Pansy shouted, “Since when?” and Hermione involuntarily sloshed firewhisky onto the ground.

Harry and Draco looked at each other.

“Merlin, I think I might vomit,” Ron said. “Er,” he added, “because of the whisky. Not because of any bad mental images I’m definitely not having.”

Pansy got out her wand again and conjured water. She did it without difficulty, even though she’d drunk as much as Ron. “Drink this,” she told him. “And talk.”

“What d’you mean, talk,” said Ron, and drank the water.

“There’s nothing to talk about,” Harry said into the waiting silence as Ron gulped down the entire cup. “Because we’re not.”

“Nah, mate,” Ron said, wiping his mouth. “What about this afternoon?”

“I was taking a bath,” Draco said.

“And Harry’s shirt was wet,” Ron pointed out triumphantly. “Ha! Check and mate. Checkmate.”

“Weasley, you realise that doesn’t mean anything, right?”

“Harry didn’t deny it!” Ron argued hotly.

“You didn’t give him anything to deny!” said Draco in frustration.

“Ah, the gentleman doth protest too much, methinks,” Pansy commented wryly.

“Awfully suspicious,” Ginny agreed.

“Wizards know Shakespeare?” Hermione said.

“Who?” Pansy asked.

“Not to mention,” said Ron, making a gesture like he was trying to bat away flies, but might’ve been an attempt to draw their attention to something. “See how there is only one bed here. There. Big bed. One of it.”

“Oooh,” Ginny said. “Hey, that’s a good point.”

“Oh, let it go, you lot,” said Harry. “We’re not.”

Pansy peered at his face pensively. Then she drank.

The rest of them followed her lead, even Ron, and Harry thought with relief that the topic had been discarded.

But then Hermione, of all people, said, “Why aren’t you?”

Harry blinked at her in shock. “What?”

She pointed her index finger at him, then swerved it to Draco. “You. And him. Why not?”

“Hermione,” Harry said helplessly. “You’re drunk.”

“Yeah,” she agreed readily. “So’re you. Answer the question.”

Harry was speechless. Answer the question? It wasn’t an appropriate question! He could practically see the indignant exclamation marks dancing in front of his eyes.

Ginny burped a third time. “Y’know,” she said casually to Harry, “I used to have a crush on you.”

“Am I,” said Ron, “am I the only one here who’s never, I mean never, found Harry attractive? Because I’m starting to — to. Er. Suspect. That I’m only one, I mean, the only one. No offence,” he added. He addressed this to the mantlepiece.

“Yeah Weasley,” said Draco after a beat. “Sounds like you’re probably the only one,” and that was when Harry knew Draco was completely, absolutely, pissed out of his mind.

“Ha!” Ron exclaimed, and promptly passed out backward onto the floor.

They observed his prone form for a minute. Then: “Potter,” Draco said, a feverish glint in his eyes. “You should tell Granger why.”

Pansy opened another bottle and poured. “Yeah, Harry, tell Hermione why.”

Harry drank. “No, it’s a stupid question.”

“How’s that,” Ginny said.

“It isn’t,” said Draco, bending a knee and then pushing out his leg again, trying to sit up straighter. “It’s THE question. Why not? I’ll tell you why not, if Potter won’t.” But then he only put his glass to his lips and said nothing more.

Pansy tipped back a block of ice and crunched it. “It’s because you can’t marry him, isn’t it?” she said.

“What?” Hermione said in confusion. “I thought the wizarding world didn’t care about that sort of thing.”

Pansy wagged her finger. “Nuh uh. If Draco weren’t an only child, sure. Look at Weasley. If he wanted to go marry some bloke, it’d be fine. He’s got ten million brothers and a sister. But Draco, Draco’s got only himself. The entire family line depends on him.”

It was interesting watching Hermione trying to employ her massive brain through the haze of alcohol. “What about Tonks?”

“Tonks?” Pansy echoed. “Ah, you mean the Metamop, Meta, Metamorphmagus Auror.” She nudged Draco. “You ever met your cousin, Draco?”

“I’ve met her,” Draco said. “She’s not a Malfoy.”

“Well of course she’s not,” said Hermione blankly. “She’s still your relative.”

“You’re missing the point, Granger. If she’s not a Malfoy and not pureblood, she doesn’t count.”

“Oh,” Hermione said. “I should have known. That’s what this is about. I should have known.”

Harry heaved a sigh and moved to pour himself more firewhisky.

“I can’t believe you, Malfoy,” Hermione went on scathingly.

Draco lifted an eyebrow. “What’s so unbelievable about me, Granger?”

“That you’re willing to make yourself miserable your entire life just to propagate your own bigotry.”

“It’s my duty,” Draco snapped. “And it’s not bigotry.”

“How is it not?” Hermione challenged.

“It’s not.” Draco put his glass down and pushed it away, despite the fact that it wasn’t empty. “I don’t expect _you_ to understand, you didn’t grow up with that kind of expectation.”

“Oh, tell me more about how I did or did not grow up, Malfoy. Educate all of us.”

“You didn’t grow up walking down hallways lined with portraits of your ancestors; you didn’t learn at your father’s knee that you only exist in this place at this time with this life pounding in your chest because each of them did their duty. You didn’t _talk_ with your ancestors and have them repeat the same lesson. I don’t care how unique your Muggle upbringing was, Granger. I _know_ you didn’t have that experience.”

Hermione just stared at him. She, too, put down her glass and pushed it away.

Draco continued: “Of old, purebloods have believed that magic is our duty to pass onward. Of old, if a family was burnt at the stake, then that line of magic was gone forever. Ended. That’s what was taught to me, and I don’t see how it’s incorrect. How many students attend Hogwarts? How many is that compared to the number of Muggle schools in the British Isles?” He looked at her, and it was the most plaintive expression Harry had ever seen Draco turn on anyone other than Harry himself.

Hermione took the questions at face value and answered them. “I don’t know exactly how many Muggle schools there are. I could look it up. As for Hogwarts, there are roughly two-hundred-and-seventy to three-hundred-and-ten students, fluctuating year by year. That range is consistent across the last five centuries. The mean is two-hundred-and-eighty-four.”

“And how many wizards and witches are there in total in the British Isles?”

“If Ministry of Magic keeps an up-to-date census it’s not a matter of public record,” Hermione said. “But if we extrapolate from the number of students at Hogwarts while taking into account prolonged lifespans, that number should be somewhere around four thousand, more or less.”

“How does she just know all this?” Ginny muttered blearily.

“Less,” Draco said. “Because of war. But no matter, let’s move on. There are eleven wizarding schools in the entire world. Some larger, some smaller. Even so, we can take an estimated average for their student bodies, and from there extrapolate further. Even allowing for a large margin of error, the total population of wizardkind is a small, five digit number. Do you get it, now? There are more merpeople in the oceans than there are wizards on the earth. If we were any other being, if we weren’t human, we’d classify ourselves as endangered.”

“Merlin,” Ginny said, “I don’t want to do maths. This is why I dropped Arithmancy.”

“Shush,” Pansy said.

“But we _are_ human,” expounded Hermione with a spark of passion. “That’s just it, Malfoy. We’re human, with human choices. You speak as though your ancestors bore a heavy burden to give you, specifically, access to life. You speak as though that’s a tangible debt you have to repay. But that’s not true; that can’t be true. Because if it were then that debt, that burden — it’d be magic itself.”

“Yes,” Draco said. “That’s it. You got it, Granger. We bear the burden of what we are, and we owe a debt to ensure its survival.”

“No,” Hermione said, and actually moved across the floor to sit closer to him. “No, Malfoy. Listen to me. Every person in your lineage that came before you was a human with human choices. They didn’t know what the future would contain. They did only what they could, or what they wanted, and through a series of chances their actions culminated in you. You are attaching grand significance to random chance, a die that was rolled and happened to have your face when it landed. You were _taught_ to do so. But you shouldn’t, not like that. Not if it warps your whole life.”

“And if every pureblood thought that way, perhaps we’d be extinct in a century or two.”

“That’s not the way it _works_,” Hermione shouted, then took a deep breath and lowered her voice again. “Your parents gave you their existential crisis to carry from a young age and you don’t even realise it. Oh my god, all of you purebloods are convinced of it. It’s ridiculous. Malfoy, think. Pureblood propaganda says that pureblood families have dwindled in the last century, no?”

“It’s fact, not propaganda.”

“Greatly exaggerated truth bent for a particular narrative is propaganda. But fine. Stay with me. Keep thinking. Pureblood families have dwindled, and yet the average size of the Hogwarts student body has not changed in five centuries, and I’d wager for far longer than that. I could go and look it up right now if you want. But let’s just focus on the last five centuries. What does that tell you?”

Draco glared at her balefully.

“It should tell you,” Hermione continued insistently, “that it’s at least somewhat likely that the amount of magic in the world is constant, like the amount of water on the planet, whether it’s in the air, the ocean, the glaciers, or the flesh and blood of living beings. I researched this in first year, when people like you were telling me that I did not belong. The rise of Muggleborns attending Hogwarts is inversely proportional to the slight decline of halfblood and pureblood students.”

“Yes, Potter had that argument. He said the magic would go on in whatever form it can.”

Hermione tossed Harry a look he couldn’t quite read. “And it’s _true_. It’s true. Don’t you see? Or is it —“

“It’s not proven to be true,” Draco interrupted. “It _could_ be true, but what you have is a statistical correlation, which isn’t evidence enough for a claim of that magnitude. You know that, Granger. The nature of magic and how it transfers itself across people and across the aeons is a study that takes far more time and effort than a first year reading about Hogwarts in the library. Generations of wizards and witches have dedicated their lives to the question and drawn no definite conclusions; there are scores of books on the subject I’d wager you’ve never even heard of.”

Harry expected Hermione to be insulted, but while she did frown, it was a thoughtful frown. Gradually, she said, “Okay. Yes, you’re right. It’s not an assertion I can just make. But are you truly so bothered that people like me can have magic? Is it so important to you that magic remains in pre-existing bloodlines?”

Draco took a long time to answer. When he did, his words were halting, as though he were trying to find his way in the dark. “I know that — that to my father, it was at least partially about insulation. Keeping it within the bloodlines. Preserving the culture. I used to — I understood. But I’m not my father.” He said it again: “I’m not my father. I’ve thought about it. I’ve thought about it a lot, and — I think I know now that culture, at least, must change, will change, cannot be stagnant by its very nature. But it’s not just that. It’s also, it’s …”

“It’s like a relay race,” Ginny suddenly said. They all turned to her. “You guys know what a relay race is? It’s a Muggle game. Dad, you know, he used to — sometimes he’d find out about a Muggle game and make us all try it. There’s a baton, right. One person starts off running with it, passes it to the next one, and so on, until the last person crosses the goal. Fred used to cheat and just chuck it to George.” She paused. “Does this make sense? If our ancestors were running a relay race, right, then we’ve got this baton, and it’d be shitty if we just stopped running.”

“That’s … oddly accurate,” Draco said.

“A relay race has a goal,” Hermione said reprovingly. “Life doesn’t. Not like that.”

“So this is all very philoso —“ Pansy yawned widely — “philoso, so, sophical. And I wasn’t going to interrupt. But if this theoretical goal is reproduction, you can’t seriously tell me that life doesn’t revolve around that goal. Or am I not following this right?”

“No, in this metaphor, the passing on of the baton is reproduction. The goal is something else, which doesn’t exist.”

“What was in this firewhisky?” Ginny wondered into her glass.

“Okay,” Pansy said slowly. “But, like, do you get what I’m trying to say? Muggles don’t even have magic and surely some of them desire to pass on their genes, or else there wouldn’t be so many of them. It’s not like it’s just a weird pureblood wizard thing.”

“Right. And does Malfoy actually _want_ to pass on his genes, his magic?” Hermione questioned analytically. “Or is he simply scared of the fact that he can choose not to? Malfoy, you really need to think about this properly. It’s stupid of you to do this to yourself just so you can keep running to a goal that doesn’t exist.”

“Nah, Hermione,” Harry said. “He knows there’s no goal. But it’s important to him that he keeps running.”

“And what’s it doing to him? What’s it doing to _you_?”

Harry didn’t answer. He stood up and stumbled over to where Draco was. “C’mon, Malfoy,” he slurred softly. “Let’s go to bed.” He grabbed Draco’s arm and heaved Draco to his feet, swaying.

“Harry,” Draco said, and horribly his affection was naked for all to hear.

“God,” said Hermione. “The two of you.”

“Yep. The two of them.” Pansy raised her glass and downed what was left.

Ron made a gurgling noise.

“Ugh,” said Ginny. “There’s no way I can crawl back to the dormitories, and I’m definitely not dragging Ron with me. Can we just kip here?”

“I am; I don’t care if anyone objects,” Pansy stated. She climbed onto the couch and closed her eyes.

The walk to the bed should only have comprised of about ten steps or so, but the Room was like a ship, rocking on invisible waves. If Harry had been alone, he might have just given up and slept on the floor. But Draco was still recovering from injury, and anyway. Anyway, he couldn’t remember what the other reason was. With a groan, he flung both himself and Draco down on the bedsheets. Draco mumbled something. Harry told him to go to sleep. At least, he meant to. The last thing he heard before consciousness abandoned him was Hermione saying to Ginny that they could ask the Room to provide more beds.

***

When he woke up, he was sure he was getting murdered.

“Ow,” he said. “Fuck fuck fuck.” Upsettingly, the rhythm of the words synchronised with the rhythm of the pounding in his head.

“Good, you’re awake,” said Draco’s voice.

“Fuck,” Harry said again, for emphasis.

“Yes, I know. Potter, get up.”

“Why.”

“Because I’m an invalid who needs to pee. I’m not joking. Get up, now.”

At the suggestion of peeing, Harry realised suddenly how badly he, too, needed to go. With gargantuan effort he roused himself and, Draco in tow, undertook the epic journey to the bathroom, which nearly defeated them both.

He felt better once he’d emptied his bladder and brushed his teeth, but not by much.

“Huh,” he said, surveying the Room. “Guess the house-elves cleaned up.”

“No, actually,” contradicted Draco, lying back down on the bed. “Granger did, before she left with the others.” He kneaded his temple, and added, “The elves did send food up, but the smell made me nauseous, so I asked the Room to take it away. Morgana’s mercy, my _head_.”

Harry conjured two cups of water and handed one to Draco wordlessly. Both of them drank methodically. Harry refilled the cups.

“Maybe I can go get Hangover Potions from Pomfrey,” he suggested. It was really too bad the Room couldn’t provide them with any.

“Merlin, can you imagine how she’d react if she knew I got drunk? You’d have better luck getting some from Professor Snape.”

“I told you you shouldn’t have gotten drunk,” Harry protested. “And god, no, I’m not going to Snape.”

“If I could walk, I’d take your Cloak and go to the dungeons to brew some myself. As it is, Potter, I think we’re doomed to endure agony.”

“Hold on,” Harry said, inspired. “_I_ could take my Cloak and go to the dungeons and brew some.”

Draco did not look suitably impressed. “Do you even know how? Do you know how bad it would be for history books if you accidentally poisoned us both to death?”

“I got an Outstanding in my Potions OWL, Malfoy.”

“Miracle of miracles, Potter.”

“Fine. How about if I steal the ingredients and brew it up here? The Room can give us the equipment, and you can supervise.”

Groaning, Draco said, “Sounds like a lot of work.”

“Well, you can try and sleep it off in the meantime,” Harry told him. “I’ll leave you some more water, and I’ll try to be quick.”

He took the Map with him; the castle had changed so much, he would need it for navigation, if nothing else. The seventh floor corridor was fairly deserted, but as soon as he went down two levels, he discovered a buzz of activity. It was the middle of the morning, so most of it was people getting up and moving down to breakfast. A man with a baby strapped to his chest stopped and asked a suit of armour for directions. Two young boys ran after a cat. A Ravenclaw prefect (the only person in uniform) yelled at them, “No running in the corridors!” On the third floor, mysteriously, Flitwick was herding a flock of blue flamingoes.

Keeping out of everyone’s way was difficult, invisible as he was, but such was the general mayhem that if anyone did bump into him, they were not likely to notice. When he passed the Great Hall he peeked inside to find that it was at least five times its usual size, with some twenty-odd tables. Four of those still displayed House colours, but not everyone seemed to be paying attention to those. He spotted Blaise sitting with Padma at a neutral table, chatting more than eating. Ron was at Gryffindor surrounded by his siblings, his head in his arms. The High Table was empty save for Sprout and Babbling.

A quick perusal of the Map told him that most of the other teachers were already on patrol. Snape was walking along the edges of the Forbidden Forest. Good — that gave him ample opportunity.

The dungeons, unlike the rest of the castle, hadn’t been repurposed much. There were a few extra rooms — he passed a family coming out of one — but overall he gathered that most newcomers would have preferred living arrangements in the brighter areas. This meant, of course, that he still knew exactly where general use potions ingredients were stored.

No one was there, and the shelves were still neatly ordered, if a bit cramped. He gathered everything he needed within minutes, and was just turning to leave when behind him there came a voice he’d never thought to hear again.

“Harry, my boy, is that you?”

On a desk covered with jars and scrolls and dusty books was a small unassuming metal picture frame. Inside it was Dumbledore.

Harry, still wearing the Invisbility Cloak, froze.

Dumbledore chortled. “No need to be nervous. You can be on your way. I merely wished to say hello.”

Harry didn’t need to be told twice; he sped out of the dungeons and only remembered to slow down when he nearly crashed into an old witch creaking her way down the side of the central staircase, cane in hand.

“Who’s there?” she croaked.

His head was still pounding. Funny, he’d almost forgotten about his hangover.

How had Dumbledore known?

The old witch wagged her cane and said, “If you’re running around Disillusioned, watch where you’re going. Youngsters these days.”

Ah. Like that. Dumbledore had seen the ingredients floating off the shelves. And, unlike the witch, Dumbledore had prior knowledge of the Invisibility Cloak, and knew the difference between it and Disillusionment.

It was still unnerving. He felt tremendous relief upon reaching the Room.

He knocked on the cupboard wall and said, “It’s me,” before realising that Draco might not be able to open the door, and panicked for a split second before he realised that as he was the one who had summoned the Room in the first place, he had full control of its form.

“That was faster than expected,” remarked Draco as he entered, and then, as Harry took off the Cloak, asked, “What happened?”

“Nothing,” Harry said, brandishing the potions ingredients. “Dumbledore’s portrait saw me. Or didn’t see me, rather. I didn’t want to talk to him, so I ran away.”

Draco was wise enough to refrain from commenting, and they spent the next half hour brewing. While Draco was very particular about the consistency of the paste made from the lavendar petals and morning dew, Harry didn’t find any of it notably hard. He didn’t see how he could have mistakenly made a poison instead, but when he voiced this opinion out loud Draco only told him flatly that it was entirely possible and this was why Harry would never be an alchemist.

“I don’t want to be an alchemist,” Harry said. He pinched his nose and swallowed his portion of the potion. “Also, I’m banning the both of us from alcohol until you’re recovered.”

***

Pomfrey’s one month estimate was fairly accurate. By the second week Draco could stand up on his own if he did it slowly, and by the beginning of the third week he was walking almost as normal. Both he and Harry spent all their time in the Room, keeping an eye on Estelle’s portrait and combing through the tower of books on magical paintings. Pansy, Hermione and Ron visited them intermittently as their schedules allowed. Mostly, it was to keep them company. Sometimes, it was to bring news of what was happening outside, and hold discussions on their plans for infiltrating the Manor. All of them agreed that they could not move until Draco was better.

“We need to make sure we’re prepared,” Hermione said more than once. “It’s best if we go when You-Know-Who is elsewhere.”

This might have sounded like wishful thinking to Harry, except that there was evidence that Voldemort had been on the move. While local disappearances had become commonplace, their war had still not officially spilled to neighbouring countries, which made cases of sudden missing persons abroad that much more noteworthy. A German witch. An Austrian wizard. The witch had been a hermited recluse who tended to unicorn herds, the wizard a retired nobody estranged from his family. It wasn’t anything they could connect, and then Voldemort broke into Numengard and killed Grindelwald.

“They were both involved in Grindelwald’s war,” said Hermione. “The witch and the wizard.”

“And now Grindelwald is dead,” said Ron. “What does that tell us?”

“It tells us that You-Know-Who hunted down those people for a purpose. Information, maybe, on Grindelwald?”

“Like what, his whereabouts? Everyone knew he was in Numengard.”

“Something else, then.”

“It can’t be related to You-Know-What, can it?” asked Ron worriedly. “Maybe he’s trying to retrace another one that he misplaced?”

Hermione shook her head. “Why would he go to Grindelwald for that? Grindelwald was before his time.”

“I think I know what he was looking for,” Harry said slowly. He remembered with a sickening feeling the rumours that Ollivander had been kidnapped. That had been a year ago. “Have any of you heard of the Deathly Hallows?”

Draco and Ron had. Hermione hadn’t. They had a long debate about the probability of legendary items from children’s tales actually existing in real life, until Harry asked them if they honestly thought Dumbledore would have spent his last hour playing a practical joke. Then Hermione insisted that they pause the conversation until Pansy could be present, so that they could all be on the same page.

“That makes it easy, then,” Pansy said, once she had been brought up to speed.

“Sorry, what?” Ron said. “You-Know-Who is going after the most powerful wand in the world, and that makes things easy for us?”

“We want to lure him away from the Manor, don’t we?” Pansy asked rhetorically. “This is the perfect bait.”

Hermione turned to Harry. “You said Dumbledore said that he was going to get Snape to dispose of the wand?”

“Something like that, yeah,” he answered.

“I see,” said Hermione thoughtfully. “We can work with that.”

On the last Monday in August Draco woke up early complaining that all of his limbs itched so badly he wanted to peel his own skin off, and by Wednesday he was burning with pent up energy.

“Potter,” he said with great emphasis. “I’ve been living in this bed for my entire life and if I do not go outside and do something physically strenuous I may be forced to commit a crime.”

“Such as?”

“Such as singing Celestina Warbeck’s greatest hits nonstop until you murder me.”

Harry regarded him with interest. “Wait, would you really?”

“Don’t test me.”

“Maybe I can get the Room to make a hamster wheel for you.”

“A what? No. I need sunshine. Real sunshine. I want to go flying.”

“Our presence at Hogwarts is supposed to be a secret,” Harry reminded him patiently.

“Easy. Disillusionment Charm.”

“And if someone sees our shadows on the ground?”

“Then we can transfigure disguises like before.”

“Some people here know us well enough to see through those, if they looked closely. And wouldn’t it be weird for two student-age strangers to just suddenly show up? Most of the new people are either really young or older adults, or Muggle relatives.”

“Then we can age ourselves, or pretend to be Muggles. We’ve got plenty of Muggle clothes.”

“Muggles can’t fly on broomsticks.”

“Then we’ll run around the Quidditch pitch. Harry, I’m serious. If I don’t use my muscles in some way, I get the feeling I won’t heal properly. If you don’t believe me, let’s go talk to Pomfrey.”

Harry considered this. “I don’t disbelieve you, exactly, but let’s go and check with Pomfrey anyway.”

They snuck out together under the Cloak and used the seventh floor entrance to the hospital wing. Pomfrey ran Draco through a series of spells and agreed with his self-diagnosis: he needed to move, so despite Harry’s reservations twenty minutes later they found themselves jogging laps along the perimeter of the Quidditch pitch disguised as Muggle cousins Julius and Reginald who both had brown hair and blue eyes. Harry didn’t actually think they needed fake names, since the idea was to avoid all contact with anyone whatsoever, but the weaving of their backstories seemed to keep Draco’s mind occupied.

“We both play a Muggle sport,” he said as they ran, panting. “Which is why we’re exercising.”

“Er, Malfoy. We don’t need an excuse to exercise.”

“Ah, but what if someone asks? You can’t just tell them you’re running around because you enjoy it.”

“Yeah you can. Besides, you don’t even know any Muggle sports.”

“There’s relay races.”

Harry quirked his lips. “True. There’s relay races.”

They went around the eastern goalposts and turned blessedly into the shade cast by the audience stands. Draco said, “Tell me about a Muggle sport, then. Did you ever play any?”

“Not really. I mean, sometimes we were forced to, but I was never on a team.”

“Forced to?”

“You know, to keep you active or whatever. I had this teacher once who liked to get us to play dodgeball — or a version of it — where you get into two teams, and one team stays inside an enclosure while the other team throws balls at them, and if you get hit then you’re out.”

“So Quidditch, but everything removed except for Bludgers.”

“Some kids really enjoyed it.”

“Did you?”

“Ha, no. Dudley would get his lackeys and — um. Target me, basically. So I’d always be out really quickly.”

“Was anyone ever killed while playing?”

“What?” Harry nearly stopped running. “Of course not.”

Draco slowed down. “I mean if the entire game is just Bludgers …”

“Oh no no no,” Harry said swiftly, picking up the pace again. “We used large, soft balls. Even if you threw them hard, you wouldn’t injure anyone. Though Dudley did try.”

It was a pleasant day, without much wind. They were the only people on the pitch. The grass had grown long. Insects leapt away from their path. Harry suddenly wished fervently that they could get on broomsticks and fly like Draco had wanted, but it was risky enough already just being outside. Still, he found that he didn’t regret it; the long period of confinement indoors had been getting to him as well.

They’d started on their sixth lap when Draco abruptly stopped and knelt down.

“What’s wrong?” Harry asked, dropping down as well.

Draco had one hand on the ground and the other on his head. “Dizzy,” was all he said.

With an air of concentration and laboured breath, he remained in the same rigid position, eyes squeezed shut, face pale and sweating. Harry rubbed his back, trying not to worry.

This went on for several minutes, but just as Harry was considering sending a Patronus to Pomfrey, Draco said in a strained voice, “Help me up.”

He was steady on his feet once he was standing, but he did not look well, and Harry suggested that they go back to the castle.

“We probably should have ran less and walked more,” he said as they went. “You’re still recovering.”

Draco was subdued. “It came on so suddenly.”

Harry tried to be reassuring. “Well, sometimes people get lightheaded, don’t they? Aunt Petunia used to feel faint whenever she stood up too quickly.”

“Your aunt is a Muggle, Potter.”

“What, it’s different for wizards?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Hm. Shall we go to Pomfrey again?”

“Maybe,” replied Draco reluctantly.

“Let’s go,” Harry said firmly.

They nearly entered the hospital wing from the first floor as Julius and Reginald; Harry stopped them at the last second, deciding that it would be better to go as themselves, Cloaked, and so they trudged back up to the seventh floor to undo their disguises in private.

As they waited for a staircase to oblige them on the fifth floor, Harry heard Pansy’s voice. He tugged on Draco’s elbow, and together they peered around the corner.

“You shouldn’t be all the way up here,” Pansy was saying to a young boy with short, dark hair. He was dressed in a set of robes that looked like they had been shrunken to fit with a spell, except he had rolled up the hem and tied it off messily at the waist. Underneath, he was wearing Muggle trousers. The two of them were standing in the threshold of an open doorway underneath a sign which read ‘_H.O.H.O._‘ “It would be very easy for you to get lost.”

“No it wouldn’t,” replied the boy. “The suits of armour can always show me where to go, and anyway I could just find some stairs and go down to the canteen.”

“Ah, you’re underestimating this place, Jonah,” said Pansy with a faint smile of amusement. “Sometimes, if you try to go downstairs too hard, you’ll end up on the same floor you started on, or maybe even higher.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. I’m good with directions. I wouldn’t mess up that badly.”

Pansy laughed. “Hogwarts has never cared too much about directions. Listen to me, okay, Jonah? This is a magic castle, for people with magic. Those things that you can do, sometimes — like when you make objects fly — that’s magic.”

“I know,” Jonah said sulkily. “You told me that already.”

“You have magic,” Pansy went on patiently. Harry had never seen her so patient. “But your little sister Chaya doesn’t. So you have to help us look after her. Things that may seem obvious or simple to you about this castle may be confusing and difficult for her.”

“How come?”

“Because magic defines what we can do, what we can see, what we can be. Remember when Diggory showed you the broom? Remember how it didn’t work for Chaya? It’s like that, but on a bigger scale.”

“I won’t play on a broom if Chaya can’t.”

“Okay, that’s up to you, but you both still have to live at Hogwarts for a while longer, so —“

“How much longer? I want to go home.”

“Jonah,” Pansy said. “Your house burnt down. You know this.”

Jonah crossed his arms. “It’s fuzzy.”

“Yes, because we put your memories in the Pensieve.”

“I want to go home.”

Pansy put a hand on his shoulder. “I know, Jonah. But if home is a place and it burns down, you can’t go back. Not right away.”

“Should she be saying that?” Harry whispered to Draco.

“It’s better than lying, isn’t it?” Draco replied.

“I miss Mummy and Daddy,” Jonah said again, and now his voice had that precarious wobble to it that preceded tears.

“Jonah,” Pansy said, a little helplessly. She drew him into her arms as he began to cry. His wails filled the corridor, attracting the attention of other people passing by.

“Come on,” Draco said, as their line of sight was blocked. “The staircase is here.”

***

Pomfrey sent them to Snape.

They’d had to wait a long time for her in her office, and she’d seemed rather stressed when she finally came in to see them. Apparently, she’d spent the entire morning trying to explain to a Muggleborn witch’s family that she could not heal most Muggle illnesses with magical solutions, that the stock of potions she had available would do them more harm than good. Pomfrey had very obviously needed a cup of tea and some peace and quiet, which had made Harry feel rather awkward about taking up more of her time. Which in turn may have been why he had so easily accepted her advice to see Snape instead.

“Potter,” Draco said in an undertone as they sneaked their way invisibly to Snape’s office, “I really don’t want to go bother Professor Snape because I felt dizzy for two seconds.”

“Wow,” Harry commented. “This might be the first time ever you’ve agreed with me about not wanting to see Snape.”

“So let’s not?”

“Too late,” Harry said, and knocked on the door.

“Enter,” said Snape’s voice. The door opened itself.

“My apologies for disturbing you, Professor Snape,” said Draco, as soon as Harry had taken off the Cloak and he was visible.

“Mr Malfoy,” Snape said. “Please, have a seat.”

Notably, he declined to offer the same hospitality to Harry. Harry sat down anyway.

“Are you aware, Draco,” Snape drawled, “that you were seen gallivanting down the streets of Hogsmeade with Potter a few weeks ago?”

Draco glanced at Harry. “That wasn’t us.”

“I should think not,” Snape said. “You behaved appallingly.”

“We haven’t left the castle,” Harry told him.

“As I am as much cognizant of Draco’s condition as you are, Potter, I do not require you to tell me where you have or have not been. Rather, you should offer Draco your regrets for distributing his hair so carefreely to the likes of the Weasley twins.”

Harry frowned. “I saw Hermione put the hair into the Polyjuice myself; there wasn’t any extra. We just needed to be seen leaving.”

“And did it occur to you that if their performance was not convincing enough it would only invite speculation?”

“What d’you mean?” Harry asked. “What did they do?”

“They acted like a pair of fools,” Snape said with an unbecoming smile. “So: a convincing rendition of you, Potter, but I assure you many will be wondering what you have done to Draco Malfoy.”

Draco suppressed a laugh. Harry elbowed him.

“Which brings me to the real issue,” said Snape, eyeing their interaction with distaste. “Albus Dumbledore’s portrait informed me some time ago that you stole several ingredients from my store.”

Harry froze. He saw now that there was a metal picture frame on one corner of Snape’s desk, partially obscured by a jar of dried foxglove leaves. It was empty.

Snape went on, “I confirmed what was missing. You took what was necessary for a Hangover Potion, Potter. Ergo, you had been drinking. And if you had been drinking, then it is likely that Mr Malfoy also partook. Am I wrong?”

“Er,” Harry said nervously. “No.”

“No?”

“No … sir.”

Snape slammed a hand on the desk. “And this happened barely one day after Draco Malfoy nearly died? Were you not aware that he had been the victim of one of the most dangerous blood curses achievable without animal sacrifice? Had you not seen his condition? Could you not intuit that his internal organs, not to mention his magic, were in a delicate state? What were you thinking, Potter, to let him drink?”

“I,” Harry stammered. “It wasn’t — I mean. I —“

“He said he didn’t think it was a good idea,” Draco interjected. “I was the one who did it anyway. It’s my responsibility, sir.”

Snape looked at him. “Yes, Draco. You were stupid, too. But Potter put your life in danger, and then he did it again for no reason whatsoever other than to satisfy his own selfishness in wanting your inebriated company for a night of adolescent indulgence.”

Harry took a deep breath. “Sir. You’re right. I shouldn’t have let Draco drink. I apologise.”

“What use is an apology issued to me, Potter?” said Snape contemptuously.

Harry turned to Draco. Draco put a finger on Harry’s mouth and shook his head.

“If you are not more careful, Potter,” Snape continued, “you will be the death of him. Just like your father was the death of your mother.”

Taking another deep breath, Harry started to say, “I’ll be more careful,” but Draco’s frigid voice drowned him out:

“Don’t speak to him like that.”

An expression of surprise flickered over Snape’s face but was quickly suppressed. He said, “I’ll speak to Potter in whichever manner I please. Salazar knows he’s experienced precious little of discipline throughout his life.”

Draco was looking at Snape as though seeing him for the first time. He said, “You don’t know Harry at all, do you?”

The sneer Snape put on was somewhat defensive. “I know Potter as well as anyone can know him, Mr Malfoy.”

“You think,” Draco said, “that he’s like his father. That he _is_ his father.”

“I assure you,” Snape returned, “that anyone who knew his father would see the same resemblance that I do.”

“Would they?” Draco questioned scornfully.

“Of course they would. Every inch of him is exactly like James Potter, from his face, to his arrogance, to his callous use of his friends. And just as James Potter endangered the life of Lily Evans, so too —“

“Was it James, Severus, who endangered Lily’s life, or was it someone else?”

Dumbledore.

Snape actually flinched.

“Harry, if you’d be so kind, would you mind lifting my frame up from behind this jar?”

Harry did so, slowly. He put Dumbledore down on a stack of books in full view of the rest of the room.

“Thank you, my boy.” Dumbledore beamed at them. “Now, where were we? Ah, yes. Harry’s resemblance to his father. I must admit, Harry, that you do physically resemble your father quite strongly, although you have your mother’s eyes, as you well know.” He paused enigmatically. “Of course, the most important thing is not physical resemblance, but what is inside. Your parents were incredibly courageous people. I should hope that you are the same.”

Harry thought of his final conversation with the real Dumbledore, and wondered when this memory of Dumbledore had been last updated.

Snape had focused on the portrait with an indecipherable expression. He said, “Why are you here? Is it time?”

“No,” said Dumbledore. “Not yet.”

Snape made a bitter sound that only vaguely called to mind laughter. “And you would berate me for berating the boy when you will do far worse?”

“Did I berate you? No, Severus, I merely wished to remind you of events as they had originally transpired. Lest we forget our own deeds.”

“I have never forgotten,” Snape said sourly. “Not for a day, not for a second. Which is why, Albus, that I find it so repulsive —“

“Not yet, Severus.” Dumbledore inclined his head in Draco’s direction. “For now, tend to the problem at hand. Do you not wish to know why Harry and Mr Malfoy have called upon you?”

***

In the end, Snape could not say for certain what the direct cause behind Draco’s sudden dizziness had been, although he strongly implied that he blamed their reckless drinking when Draco should have been resting. The potions he had given to Draco to counteract the curse had been of his own making, based on knowledge from texts and experience from the first war. They had worked as he had expected them to, and all the diagnosis spells indicated that Draco was healing as he should. It was highly possible that the dizziness was only a lingering aftereffect, and as it had only happened once so far they could not leap hastily to a prognosis. All Snape could do was brew a tonic and instruct Draco to drink it daily after breakfast.

Draco actually assisted Snape in brewing the tonic, but he was very subdued. He said things like, “Thank you, sir,” and “May I use this mortar?” with perfect politeness that somehow nonetheless managed to impart rebuke. Snape, in his turn, acted as though this version of Draco was entirely normal and that Harry, sitting in the corner watching them, did not exist.

It was wonderful to return to the Room at last.

“Thank god,” Harry said, putting away the Cloak. “The house-elves sent up lunch. I’m bloody starving.”

“Yeah,” Draco said distractedly.

Harry moved the tray of food to the hearth and laid down on some cushions. Draco sat nearby and lit the fire with a wave of his wand.

After a while of singlemindedly stuffing his face, Harry noticed that Draco was staring into space. He nudged him with his foot. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” Draco said. “You’ve gotten crumbs all over yourself, by the way.”

Harry pushed the tray in his direction. “Eat.”

“I’m not that hungry.”

“Aren’t you? We had an early breakfast, _and_ we exercised. Why aren’t you hungry?”

“I’m thinking.”

“Can’t you chew on your thoughts and chew on food at the same time, Malfoy?” Harry sat up and leaned on him. “Eat something, to make me happy.”

Draco reached up an idle hand and danced it almost absentmindedly through Harry’s hair. “All right. To make you happy.”

“Also,” Harry said, once Draco’s mouth was full, “tell me what you’re thinking of. You’re worried.”

Draco had three more bites of the chicken sandwich before he replied. “Professor Snape really, really hates you.”

“Er, yeah.”

“Because he hated your father?”

“I guess. All evidence points that way.”

Draco kept eating, in the manner of a soldier resolved to marching.

Harry asked cautiously, “Did you … did it surprise you?”

“I knew he disliked you,” Draco said. “But he dislikes almost everyone.”

“I think it’s been pretty obvious over the years that he dislikes me more than he dislikes almost everyone else,” Harry offered wryly.

Draco mulled this over. “Maybe. I just didn’t see it.” He hesitated.

“Don’t apologise,” Harry warned.

Draco let out a breath, then smiled. “I wasn’t going to.”

“It’s okay, anyway,” Harry said. “He thinks very highly of you. You should … Well, you know. Blah blah blah. Not ruin it.”

“Eloquent.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Draco ate the rest of his meal in silence. When he finished, he levitated the tray away and Vanished all the crumbs on the floor. Then he dislodged Harry slightly from his shoulder and moved the both of them toward the cushions, pulling Harry down with him. Mildly bemused, Harry made himself pliable.

Draco turned him to face the fire and curled up behind, nose against his spine, arm around his waist, and Harry recognised the familiar warmth and the frightening tenderness. Lately, at night, they’d often wound up in similar positions.

“Harry,” Draco said, after a long wordless interval. “Do you know what Professor Snape could have meant, when he asked Dumbledore’s portrait if it was time?”

“No,” Harry answered. “I’ve been thinking about it as well. I suppose in typical Dumbledore fashion we’ll hear about it when he thinks it’s relevant.”

“It bothers me.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“It really bothers me.”

“I know, Draco.” 

Draco was quiet.

Harry changed the subject. “Have you felt dizzy at all since the Quidditch pitch?”

“No.”

“Good. It’ll be okay.”

Draco curled in even closer, and didn’t reply.


	28. Chapter 28

“Why have you made six bullet points on fixative application for animated charcoal and then crossed them out?” Hermione asked. She held up the sheet of parchment with Harry’s notes and waved it, as if she didn’t trust him to admit that they were his.

“I dunno,” Harry said, shrugging. “I was just summarising the information, sort of, and then I realised it probably wasn’t useful.”

“The point of making notes while researching,” Hermione said with a pained expression, “is to collect and isolate what is relevant. The process of filtering should happen before you write things down, not after.”

“Let it go, Granger,” Draco advised. “You must know how he is.”

Annoyed, Harry said, “Why don’t you just look at Malfoy’s notes? He already compiled everything from what I took down, _and_ everything he read through.”

“He might’ve missed something,” Hermione mumbled, ducking her head.

Draco turned to her. “I beg your pardon?”

“Do I need to be here?” asked Pansy.

“Probably not,” Harry answered.

“What about me?” said Ron. “If Pansy is allowed to leave, then I also —“

“Don’t be silly, Ron,” scolded Hermione. “We all need to be here; it’s difficult enough to get everyone together, what with everything that needs our attention these days. You can’t just leave because you’re bored.”

Harry grimaced sympathetically at Ron across the large round mahogany table. It was a fairly new addition to the Room. Harry had already had to enlarge it twice to fit all the stacks of books.

“I wouldn’t be bored if we were actually _doing_ something,” Ron said. “Instead you’re just sitting there reading. I thought the point of meeting up was to talk over the plan?”

“To plan things I first need to know things,” Hermione told him officiously. She had brought multi-coloured Muggle sticky notes and probably would have been enjoying herself if it were not for the fact that everyone else had been watching her with impatience for the last half an hour. “And I haven’t had time yet to read through everything; you know how busy I’ve been.”

“You do realise we have to go down to the Welcoming Feast in an hour? You must, since you’re the one who insisted on it. Which, by the way — not sure why you bothered.”

“The school year is still happening, we’re still conducting lessons to the best of our ability, and the Welcoming Feast gives people a sense of structure.”

“Hermione, you don’t need to read through it all,” Harry said, leaning forward. “We haven’t found anything useful. There’s some interesting myths about people going into paintings during Merlin’s time, but I doubt it’s anything we can try, if it’s even true. More likely, it’s just reference to or a variation of that enchantment which creates a physical passage between two linked paintings.”

“Physical passage?” Hermione said curiously.

“The Hermes Charm,” Draco elaborated. “It was popular several centuries ago. One could use paintings to travel between say, the main estate and the summer house. But it required the cooperation of the subject of the linked painting, which was sometimes inconvenient, so it fell out of favour once the Floo network was established.”

“And it’s not a charm you can spell into place without runic anchors and all sorts of things,” Harry added, “so it’s of no use to us. I mean, to use Estelle’s portrait to gain access to, for instance, Swallow’s Rest, right — well we’d need to already have access to Swallow’s Rest to anchor the charm in the first place. Also, it’s completely beside the point, since we’re not going there — unless you’ve changed the plan — and we’d need Estelle to help us anyway —“

“Okay, all right,” Hermione protested. “I get it.” She pushed her hair back from her face. “There was nothing useful? At all?”

“There are things you can do to modify a painting,” Harry said. “And the original painter can certainly force a subject back into frame. But nothing that _we_ could do. Seriously, I read about some woman who spent twenty years honing her skills before she painted her first successful portrait that held a personality and not just an impression, and she was like, famous for being the fastest.”

“What about Ria?” Pansy said, and when everyone looked at her, went on, “Astoria Greengrass. I’ve seen her work, she’s quite good. She had this great sketch of Draco flying.”

“Astoria’s far more interested in landscapes,” said Draco. “And you heard Potter: twenty years. The sketch of my flying was just an enchanted sketch, it didn’t hold my personality. We need a master painter, and even then …”

Hermione looked thoughtful. “Well, Aristides Nott can’t be the only master painter available. We might be able to find someone else to help us.”

“They wouldn’t be the original painter,” Harry said.

“We can still try. Who does the Hogwarts portraits?”

“I looked into that,” said Draco. “Several of the older portraits were done by the Nott family, of course, but Dumbledore commissioned his own from the French artist Manet.”

“Manet?” Hermione sounded confused.

“No relation to the Muggle one,” Harry told her. “Weird coincidence.”

Hermione nodded slowly. “Okay. Then let’s owl this … Manet.” She motioned to Draco. “Malfoy, you can write the letter.”

Draco’s eyebrows met his hairline. “Don’t presume to give me orders, Granger.”

“You’re fluent in French,” Hermione responded. “Do it. Please.”

Harry prodded Draco underneath the table with his foot.

“Ugh,” Draco said.

“That’s settled, then,” concluded Hermione briskly.

“See?” Ron said. “Easy.”

“You didn’t contribute anything,” Pansy pointed out.

“I got the ball rolling. That counts.”

Hermione cleared her throat. “I still want to read through all the notes.” She made a face at their expressions. “But all right, I’ll do that later. In the meantime, let’s go over the proposal for Operation Malfoy Manor.”

“The proposal,” Pansy drawled. “Of course you drafted a proposal.”

“Of course,” said Hermione, with no hint of sarcasm. From a small beaded bag she drew an enormous stack of papers which made a dull thunk as she set them down on the table. “I’ve compiled a plan of action based on knowledge gathered thus far. There’s a copy for each of you, with your assignments. I think we should be ready to move by no later than the end of September, depending on variables.”

“Assignments?” said Ron.

“You’ll be working with Pansy for yours,” Hermione told him.

“Oh, wonderful,” Pansy said with absolutely no inflection.

“The most important assignment,” Hermione continued, “is yours, Malfoy. We need information on the Manor grounds. The interiors too, if possible. Now —“ she held up her palm, as Draco opened his mouth to speak — “I’m aware that the Manor is an ancient magical residence with an inconstant shape, but in even so, certain areas will always remain in the same place, in the same form. We need to be aware of those to orient ourselves.”

Draco Summoned his copy of the proposal. “I could certainly draw you a map, I suppose, but I doubt it would be of much use, even with the core rooms marked.”

“A map would be appreciated.” Hermione got out her wand as well and spelled over everyone’s copies. “Except that was not what I had in mind.”

***

“And this would be the bloody ballroom, then?” Ron said with equal parts disgust and awe.

“This is Mother’s function room,” Draco said, sounding bored. “She holds her luncheons here. It overlooks her rose garden.” He nodded at the tall windows.

They all watched a young Draco, age probably around six or seven, fly across the room on a broomstick. It didn’t look like a toy broomstick.

“We’re on the second floor?” Hermione was notetaking — an entirely pointless action, since none of them were strictly corporeal while within the Pensieve. Harry supposed it just made her feel better.

“Correct. Mother used to ask the house-elves to relocate the furniture when she wasn’t entertaining guests.”

“Yeah, I can see why,” Harry remarked.

“Aw,” Pansy gushed. “Look at you, darling. You were so cute.”

Draco smirked. “I was an adorable, charming child. Everyone said so.”

“Hyperactive is more like it,” Ron observed, as Draco rose too high and nearly crashed into a chandelier.

Harry sort of agreed. It was already the eighth memory, and so far all of them had involved following a tiny Draco in his rampages around the Manor, with nary a disciplinary figure in sight. From Ron’s point of view, it must have seemed like Draco had grown up doing whatever he wanted all the time, surrounded by opulence.

As far as limited points of view went, it wasn’t strictly inaccurate.

“Draco,” said a voice from within the memory, outside the room. Harry had not heard Lucius Malfoy speak in over a year and a half.

As young Draco turned to the doorway with a comical look of guilt, his father appeared.

Lucius looked stern and faintly exasperated, but when Draco made a smooth landing on the marble floor, he smiled. It changed his face; all at once, he was young and handsome. He leant down and held out his arms. “Son, come here.”

The real Draco, standing next to Harry, jerked as if slapped. He said, expressionless, “Next.”

The memory dissolved and reformed around laughter.

“Huh,” Harry said. “It’s me.”

It was him during the summer between first and second year, when he had been invited to the Manor for the first time. His younger self looked rather shellshocked. As well he should have; he’d just been teleported from the stuffy confines of Privet Drive to what may as well have been another universe.

Young Draco stopped laughing at whatever he had found funny and positioned an authoritative hand around young Harry’s wrist, and they all moved out of his way as he strode along the wide corridor, away from the drawing room, saying, “Come on, Potter.”

“You’ve seen all the core rooms in detail now,” said present-day Draco. “This is a more generalised overview of the rest of the Manor.”

They followed the tour through to the west wing. Ron kept distracting Hermione from her notes by pointing out inconsequential things like the peacocks strutting around outside in the garden.

Harry let the others move ahead a few paces. He touched the sleeve of Draco’s robe, an odd mirror of their younger selves. When Draco didn’t object, he stepped in closer and twined their fingers together.

“I’d forgotten,” Draco murmured. “That memory was supposed to end sooner.”

Harry made a noise of acknowledgement, squeezed his hand.

Draco let out a breath. “Look at us. You were so openly dismayed, Potter. No sense of ettiquette at all.”

Young Draco kept glancing at young Harry’s face as if to gauge his reaction. Young Harry, completely oblivious, alternated between blankness and bemusement. Harry supposed it did come off as somewhat rude.

“I wasn’t dismayed,” Harry said. “I just didn’t know how to react.”

“And we’ve put you in the blue room,” young Draco announced. He was doing all the talking. There might have been a tinge of nervousness to the chatter that Harry hadn’t noticed previously. “It’s near my room. I’m sure you’ll find it perfectly adequate.”

“Right,” said young Harry doubtfully, when young Draco paused for a beat too long.

“Of course, if you have any objections …” young Draco said uncertainly, and then gathered all his pomp and ceremony together in the snottiest drawl possible: “Though I can’t imagine that you will, after spending such a horridly long time with Muggles. Is it true that their homes are often infested with diseased rats?”

Young Harry stopped walking and stared at him.

“What?” said young Draco, hackles rising almost immediately.

“That’s such a stupid question,” said young Harry finally, after several more seconds of silence. “That’d be like if I asked … if I asked, like, if all wizards pulled rabbits out of hats, or something.”

“Rabbits?”

Young Harry crossed his arms. “Diseased rats don’t live in Muggle homes.” A pause. “Well, not in most of them.”

“But Father says that they’re infested,” young Draco insisted, “and that they had to develop these death traps to kill the rats, instead of just putting down wards like normal civilised people. So their houses are just full of these death traps, and …”

Hermione shook her head. “What a terrible analogy. Rabbits out of hats, honestly.” She looked over her shoulder, one eyebrow lifted. It rose even higher at the sight of their clasped hands.

“Wait,” said Ron, who was still following the argument between young Draco and young Harry. “So do Muggles have mouse traps or not? ‘Cause Dad — he had a whole collection of them at one point, but then Mum had to get rid of them because Fred and George stole some and er. Only time I’ve ever seen Charlie lose it, let me just say.”

Hermione turned back. “Yes, Ron, Muggles have mouse traps. No, not all Muggles homes are infested.”

“Please let us not have a lecture on this topic,” Pansy said in fervent prayer. “I really, really do not care.”

“You don’t even need to be here,” Hermione told her with a frown. “You already know the Manor’s layout, and in any case you’re not even coming with us.”

“Don’t be so uptight, Hermione,” Pansy replied in that friendly yet blunt way she had. “I wanted to see Draco’s memories, so I’m here. You should try that: doing what you want.”

“I can’t fathom what you mean.”

The two of them continued arguing in this passive-aggressive fashion as they all ascended the west wing staircase, and made many snide comments directed at each other throughout the rest of the tour. It distracted everyone from how awkwardly young Draco and Harry seemed to be getting along, for which Harry was grateful.

At last, young Draco concluded the tour and announced that refreshments would be awaiting them in the sun room. He did so with a great flourish, and Harry only understood now that he had been trying to copy Narcissa’s intonation and not quite succeeding.

Young Harry said, still so blankly, “Okay, thanks.”

“Or maybe,” said young Draco, tilting his head, “we should skip to lunch. You look hungry.”

Young Harry winced and said, with a tinge of discomfit, “I’m not that hungry.”

The memory ended before young Draco replied. Harry felt, abruptly, the ache of his behind, having been left too long sitting in the same position on the hard chair. The Pensieve winked light and silver in the centre of their circle. Draco already had his wand out to stir its surface and retrieve his recollections.

“Mate,” said Ron casually, “you looked hungry enough to eat a hippogriff — _ow_, Hermione, why’d you kick me?”

Hermione cleared her throat but did not answer. Instead, she said, “Thank you, Malfoy, that was extremely thorough and well organised.”

For a brief second, Draco preened, then caught himself. “Of course it was.” He added to Ron, “Hippogriff wasn’t on the menu that day, but I tend to agree — Potter was a terrible liar.”

“I need a day to analyse,” Hermione said.

“You have a firecall with McGonagall tomorrow,” Pansy disagreed. She appeared not at all bothered that she and Hermione had been digging at each other just moments before. “You need to give yourself more time.”

“I’d like to be ready as soon as possible,” Hermione maintained, rubbing at her face. “Once You-Know-Who moves, we have to go immediately.”

Pansy pursed her lips. “Which is why my assignment is the one you’ll be waiting on, and it’s a delicate task. You have room to pace yourself more.”

“I’m just thinking, if it doesn’t work out, if he — even if he doesn’t vacate the Manor, we may still have to risk it. We can’t afford to wait indefinitely.”

Steely resolve pooled in Pansy’s eyes. “We won’t.”

***

An owl came back from Manet, informing them exceedingly politely that it was impossible for him to consider tampering with another master painter’s work. Even if it would aid Britain’s war — which he seemed to doubt — he insisted that to do what they requested would be morally and ethically wrong. And in any case, the letter concluded, it would be nigh impossible for him to repaint the subject of the portrait in the first place with no reference.

“It was worth a try,” said Hermione, her disappointment obvious.

Not wanting to leave any stone unturned, Harry swallowed his pride and his reluctance and sought out Dumbledore’s portrait. If anyone could aid them, or even merely provide cryptic hints towards a solution, it would be Dumbledore, or a convincing copy of what he had been. But each time, the painting in McGonagall’s office had either been unoccupied or asleep, deaf to any and all attempts to wake him.

“He’s avoiding me,” Harry told Draco. “Why would he do that?”

Draco shrugged. “Why does Dumbledore do anything?”

“I should have asked him straight away when he caught me taking ingredients from Snape’s store.”

It meant that everything hinged ever more critically on the Manor infiltration. Harry reminded himself that retrieving Theo had been what he’d wanted initially all along.

Every morning now, he and Draco rose early to jog around the Quidditch pitch in their Muggle disguises. Draco made no more direct complaints about attacks of vertigo, but twice Harry saw him stumble and turn away with a sickly pallor to rest in the shade. He drank Snape’s tonic daily with breakfast.

In the afternoons Harry met with Hermione and the Weasley twins to set the trap. They not only had to lure Voldemort away, they had to keep him away for as long as possible. It was turning into a much bigger operation than Harry had imagined, but he could not think of way they could conceivably accomplish what they needed without the aid of at least some of the Order. Unable to disclose their real target, Hermione had framed it as a quest for more detailed intelligence on planned Death Eater raids. She had become adept at keeping people on a ‘need to know’ basis. It was a little disturbing.

Once Pansy finished priming her network — or maybe it was partly Narcissa Malfoy’s network, Harry wasn’t sure — and the first set of rumours were leaked, things began to move very quickly.

Perhaps none of them had had enough appreciation for just how volatile the rumours would be. The initial encounter proceeded according to plan; by the time the Death Eaters had arrived at the abandoned shack, Fred Weasley — Polyjuiced as Harry — and a few select Order members were well prepared to lead them on a chase through wild country before disapparating to safety. The next time didn’t go nearly as well. No Death Eaters met them; instead, the black cloak of night was broken by a thin, hair-raising scream, far enough off in the distance to first merit curiosity, and then drawing ever closer, until Lee Jordan recognised at last, too late, that it was the cry of a banshee. There had been four in that party, and Harry saw them all in the hospital wing after, saw the banshee’s scream sliding oil-slick behind their eyes — there would only be a short window to overturn the curse, in the moment it chose a target and manifested. If they were not on constant alert, if there were any sign of weakness — no one wanted to acknowledge it out loud.

They tried to be ever more cautious, then, and Harry enlisted Draco’s help to reinforce his Occlumency barriers, paranoid that any hint of their intentions would leak through, and yet still the third encounter spun out of their control. The Death Eaters brought with them a hive of silver-belly red kraits, forced into a frenzy by either Parseltongue or magic. The kraits, small enough to wrap neatly around an adult wrist, could not be made to let go once they had bitten down, and the Order members were forced to disapparate carrying extra passengers on a failing nervous system. They arrived already hallucinating at the rendezvous point near Hogsmeade, and Madam Pomfrey could not ascertain whether or not Cedric Diggory would keep his eyesight.

After that, Harry told Pansy that it could not be dragged out any further. Either the bait already provided would work, or it wouldn’t. Pansy agreed, and leaked the location of the final, false safehouse.

Word of Voldemort’s movements came in the middle of the night. Harry had been deeply asleep, and whatever dream he had been dreaming was suddenly broken with an mighty crash of thunder, as if a sword slashed the sky. He untangled from Draco and had fallen half out of the bed in wild inexplicable panic before his mind caught up and informed him that it was Dobby, standing wide-eyed by the couch. Every single candle in the room had been lit.

“Is it now?” Harry demanded of him, heartbeat pounding in his eardrums. “It’s happened?” He stood up properly, looking for his robes. Draco handed them to him.

“Yes,” said Dobby. “Dobby asked the Manor. The Manor is difficult to speak to, now, but Dobby thinks it is telling Dobby now. He Who Must Not Be Named has left.”

“Okay,” Harry said, pulling his robes on. “Okay.” He checked the time, then picked up the backpack. Hermione had helped him put an Extension Charm on it, and now he stuck his arm and part of his torso inside, checking to see if everything they needed was in place.

“Relax, Potter,” said Draco. “Everything’s there.” Contrary to his words, he sounded quite nervous himself.

“‘Tis very dangerous,” said Dobby worriedly. “Harry Potter is being unwise, begging your pardon.”

Harry shouldered the backpack. “You’re not wrong, probably.”

Draco was more frank. “Shouldn’t you go wake the others?”

“Dobby is going,” Dobby replied. But he didn’t disapparate, and instead drew from his oversized Muggle jacket a small book. No, it wasn’t a book: it was a picture frame, pocket sized. “Harry Potter must take this with him.”

“Why?” Harry asked suspiciously. He took it and examined it, seeing the even coat of muted blue paint on the canvas.

“Professor Dumbledore said Dobby must give this to Harry Potter.”

“You spoke to Dumbledore’s portrait?”

“Professor Dumbledore said it is very important.”

Harry felt a touch of cold; goosebumps rose. “It’s a copy of his portrait, isn’t it?”

Dobby bobbed his head. Whether it was in the affirmative to Harry’s question or merely a confirmation that his task had been completed wasn’t clear. “Dobby is going now. Harry Potter is being careful, please.” He vanished.

“If it’s Dumbledore’s portrait, then he means to spy on us,” observed Draco.

“Why’s he been avoiding me for the past few weeks, then?” Harry wondered.

“Will you take it?”

Harry sighed. “For now, yes.” He put it in the backpack. “Ready? Let’s go.”

***

The five of them met at the gates. Hermione was the last to arrive, coming down the path a few minutes after Ron.

“Sorry,” she panted. “Had to … double-check … everything.” She waved a hand, out of breath from running through the castle. “Quickly, now.”

Pansy handed her a broom. Harry, Draco and Ron were already mounted. Hermione got on hers with a dubious expression and an uncertain wobble.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” Pansy instructed them, and kissed Harry and Draco each once on the cheek, as light as a bird. “For luck.”

Ron put up an arm warningly as she turned around. “Er, no thanks.”

Pansy wrinkled her nose and said disdainfully, “Ew, no, Weasley. Why would I? Don’t flatter yourself.”

That was their last sight of her as they rose up into the dark: mouth twisted in a sneer, eyes glimmering with concern. Soon she was lost beneath the thickening of shadow and the crackling of the wards they were passing through.

“I’ll take Hermione,” Harry said to Draco as they flew. “You take Ron. As soon as we can apparate.”

“I know,” Draco said.

It was cloudy over Hogwarts, and it was cloudier still in Wiltshire. They apparated into almost complete blackness. The apparition was more sluggish than usual, thanks to their efforts to make as little sound as possible. Harry materialised unsteadily on his broom and let himself slide off onto the soft dirt beneath, then caught Hermione just in time to prevent her from falling. A few paces away, he heard a snuffling sound from an animal: a cow. It was asleep.

Hermione had cast a faint _Lumos_. She shielded it underneath her cloak to concentrate the beam. “Which way?”

“_Point Me_.” Draco examined his wand, then walked uphill, stepping around the cow. “Here’s the fence. Potter?”

“Yeah, that’s it,” Harry confirmed, coming to stand next to him. “We’re at the right place.”

“Then it’s about a twenty minute walk to the south-western boundary,” Draco said. “Follow closely.”

A twenty minute walk was only about a five minute flight, going slowly with their shoes skimming blades of grass. Harry felt the presence of the Manor before Draco made the call; the original wards were still frayed, injured things, skeins of magic floating at the edge of his senses, pulling at the lightest parts of him: his hair, his breath. He shook himself like a dog.

Overlaid on top of the old wards were a set of new ones. Harry knew that they were there, but could feel nothing other than a sort of sickly tang in the air, and that he could have been imagining.

This was, arguably, the most pivotal moment.

It was still _Malfoy_ Manor. Blood knew blood, and Lucius Malfoy’s blood had coated the steps of his ancestral home as he died. The Death Eaters had neither repaired nor removed the old wards. That meant, most likely, that the Death Eaters, intruders as they were, were powerless to do anything about them. The oldest of the wards would have been there since the Manor’s foundational stones had been laid, and had been there when Draco had been born. They knew him, and they knew his ancestry. As long as they still existed, they would not allow the property to be warded against him.

Such was their hopeful theory, anyway.

Draco put his hand up to the boundary and muttered, “This is a horrible idea.” Then he glanced at Harry, stiffened his shoulders, and stepped through.

He didn’t collapse screaming in agony, and no alarm went off. They all stood silently watching him with wide eyes, not breathing. Draco passed his hand back through and Harry took it.

He, too, entered without harm.

In this manner, Draco ferried through Ron and Hermione as well. He made a face at their hands touching his. Hermione rolled her eyes at him, and then all of them were safe together on the other side.

They didn’t waste any time celebrating, but cast their Disillusionment Charms and kept flying, Harry’s hand on Draco’s shoulder, Hermione’s hand on Harry’s, Ron’s on Hermione’s.

An oppressive silence hung over the grounds. There were none of the usual nocturnal sounds: no insects, no bats, no birds. Carefully, they flew higher, high enough to see the Manor proper, still in the distance.

There were lights, but not many. Harry squinted.

“It looks crooked,” whispered Draco.

There was nothing to say to that, except that he was right, it did. Harry would have thought so even if he had never seen the Manor before; it was like looking at someone’s bones bent the wrong way. The instinctive reaction was one of wrongness.

Daring to fly faster, they approached, and landed near the stables. Harry peered into one of the stalls — the horses were gone. The place smelled dusty and disused. He hoped that the Granians and Abraxans had had the good sense to run away.

Still hand to shoulder, they shuffled through the stables and around it to tuck themselves behind the wide field maple, which Draco had shown Harry how to climb during that first awkward summer (you had to make a small jump from the stable roof). Through its branches they could see one a lit window. Disturbingly, Harry couldn’t tell which room it was supposed to be.

Draco called quietly: “Soddy.”

No answer.

“Rossy? Asok? Esak?”

Still nothing.

Draco waited a few seconds more, then said in a controlled undertone, “They must have been absorbed back into the stone, to help it keep its strength.”

“That can’t be right,” Hermione murmured, sounding sceptical. “I told you, I did the research and the last known case of a house-elf disappearing was in the 1820s, and it was just as likely the poor elf escaped due to ill treatment. There’s every evidence that a house-elf, once manifested, is an independent being.”

“We really don’t have time for this, Granger.”

“But Dobby —“

“Dobby was released by the Manor years ago; he’s attached himself to Hogwarts, as incomplete as the joining would be. Ask him about it sometime.”

“Yeah, I thought the whole reason why we couldn’t get Dobby to apparate us in was because he can’t get through anymore?” Ron commented.

“We don’t know how the Manor would react to house-elf apparition,” Hermione said. “It’s unfair to ask Dobby or any other elf to risk themselves.”

“We need a different way in,” Harry hissed, to keep them focused.

He felt Draco nod. “One of the windows. Get back on your brooms.”

They went very slowly now, inching through the air. This area was no longer so eerily silent; Harry could hear, faintly, voices from the far side of the building. Someone laughed. The startling noise of it sent tension through each of them, and in unspoken agreement they flew in the opposite direction, as far away from any light sources as possible. Draco stopped them in front of a window three storeys up. Harry felt his arm move, and suddenly the glass had vanished.

Draco turned and whispered, “Let go of me. Count to five and follow.”

The room had a damp scent. Harry stowed his Firebolt into his backpack and felt around blindly. Nothing he touched was recognisable to him. The furniture was cheap and flimsy, and the one oval mirror he found was cracked. The room was about as big as the kitchen in Privet Drive.

“I think,” said Draco gradually, “this was one of the west wing sitting rooms. I found the remains of Mother’s paperwhite narcissus there in the corner. Not a core room, but it’s in roughly the correct place. We can start from here.”

“All right,” Harry said reluctantly.

“I’ll go with Malfoy,” Ron said at once.

“No,” Harry denied. “Hermione’s Patronus is much stronger. We already discussed this, Ron.” They needed one person in each group who was already familiar with the Manor, and one person in each group capable of holding off Dementors. And that left them with only one possible configuration.

Ron made a contained sound of discontent. “If you let Hermione get hurt, Malfoy —“

“I can look after myself, Ron,” Hermione said sharply.

“Don’t waste time,” Harry bit out. “We need to move. Ron and I will go left and down.”

“And we’ll go right and up,” Hermione said. “To reconfirm: it’s quarter past two currently. Check your coins periodically. Send an update on the hour even if there’s nothing to report. If anything happens, if you get separated, go back to the stables and alert the rest of us. If no one meets you there within half an hour, leave by yourself.” A pause. The sound of a wand flicking. “There’s nothing moving in the corridor. Most likely clear.”

Tracking for movement was the best they could do. Anything stronger like _Homenum Revelio_ would have given them away. Harry patted the fake coin with the Protean Charm in his pocket. “Ready.”

“Ready,” they all echoed. Harry moved towards where Ron’s voice had sounded and grabbed his wrist in a firm hold.

They gathered around the door. Draco opened it. They separated.


	29. Chapter 29

The corridor was much narrower than it was supposed to be, and there was debris strewn across the floor. Harry, unseeing, stepped on a thin piece of ceramic and heard it crumble. He winced and cast a general Silencing Charm towards both his feet and Ron’s. It sort of worked; Ron accidentally kicked a small rock — Harry felt him stumble but heard no impact until the rock landed again by the wall. _That_ noise made him jump and look around in panic for the approaching Death Eater, until Ron breathed out, “Sorry.”

It might have been quieter to keep moving on their brooms, except in such cramped spaces they would have had limited ability to manoeuvre should they have needed to change direction fast. They kept going on foot.

Each room they passed was as diminished and warped as the sitting room Draco had identified. A lot of them were missing windows, and thus had the claustrophobic air of a prison cell. One room was completely bare save for a dried puddle of blood and what looked like fingernail clippings. Many of the doors themselves were false, opening to blank walls. The result was a mockery of a house, and Harry only felt more and more uneasy as they progressed.

He kept their search brisk and somewhat perfunctory; he doubted that Voldemort would keep any retrieved Horcruxes in areas that appeared so abandoned and malformed, and anyway there was no real place to hide anything in those shrunken spaces. No; far more likely that Voldemort had created a nest somewhere in one of the core rooms. For instance, the master bedroom on the third floor. It had windows facing north, which meant that they should be upon it soon.

Of course, it was also in that direction that they had seen lights. Inevitably, the Death Eaters were drawn towards the parts of the Manor that were stable.

Sure enough, as the corridor curved, Harry noted that he could see better. There was dim light coming from around the far corner.

Beside him, Ron suddenly jerked, but when Harry turned, alarmed, he only saw a wall full of paintings. Twenty or more frames were clustered together, all empty, like they had been evacuated. It was not a configuration Harry had ever seen before in the Manor. He thought back — none of the rooms they had been in so far had held any paintings. The house had relocated them in groups.

The movement that had alerted Ron was merely the blowing branches of an oil-painted tree. Harry gripped his wrist harder in reassurance and continued walking.

As they approached the corner, Harry paused and listened intently. Nothing. Nonverbally, he cast _Mobilatum Revelio_. Still nothing. Briefly, he wished for his Invisibility Cloak, but he had forced Draco to take it. Without it, they would have to take care to hide their shadows within the shadows of larger objects. Luckily, as the light source appeared to be naked candles, the contrast between light and dark was already weak and flickering, perfect for disguising movement from Disillusioned bodies.

He rounded the corner. This corridor was much cleaner. Safe to assume that it handled more traffic than the one they had just traversed. Framed in the candlelight were the heavy double doors that lead to the master bedroom. Opposite the doors, on Harry’s right side, were a set of staircases with uneven steps. The bannisters were the same style as those which had originally graced the main staircase of the house, but if this were the same staircase, it was in the wrong place.

With a slight chill, Harry noticed that there was a faint crack through the middle of the stairs that widened and deepened further down. Just like the one that had carved through the main staircase, except in miniature. The house remembered.

He turned deliberately away and stepped closer to the doors. There was nothing else down the long stretch of corridor except for a dead end. It was uniquely disorientating. He tried to reorganise his mental map of the house, then shook his head. Never mind. The master bedroom first.

The spell found no movement inside. He caught Ron’s attention with a tap on the shoulder and cautiously twisted the handle. It wasn’t locked. Why wasn’t it locked? Perhaps it was a good sign, an indication that the Manor rebelled. Perhaps it meant that there was nothing of value within.

Harry held his breath and slipped in, felt Ron follow. The door closed silently.

The master bedroom, as far as Harry could tell, had not shrunk (he couldn’t say for certain, as he had never been it in before; even Draco’s Pensieve memory had shown them only a glimpse). It had a high ceiling, tall windows — all with the curtains drawn — and an absolutely massive four-poster bed, perfectly made. A fire was glowing in the hearth. It had burnt down to the embers. Four large ill-matched couches were huddled around it, as though they were seeking warmth. Not far from them was a dining table placed rather haphazardly, with one seat only at its head. A partially eaten meal waited upon it. The wine glass had tipped and rolled onto the rug. Harry bent over in examination. Dry. From this new vantage point he spied, ridiculously, a large chicken — feathers and all — underneath the table. It was lying on its side and presumably dead.

A click came from the other side of the room.

“Sorry,” muttered Ron. Harry had to strain to hear him. “Wardrobe. Heaps of clothes, nothing else. Nothing in the ensuite bathroom, either.”

“We shouldn’t talk,” Harry warned him.

“Doubt anyone would hear us whispering through those doors,” Ron replied. “Besides, how else am I supposed to tell you where I have or haven’t searched?”

If no one could hear them, then it meant that they wouldn’t hear anything either, not until someone burst through the door. An utterly useless revelation. Harry tried to put it aside and set his mind to searching.

Despite Ron’s report, he went through the bathroom himself, then came back out to help Ron with the walk-in wardrobe. It was full of rows upon rows of robes, and even Harry could tell that all of them were several decades out of fashion.

“That’s not right,” he said.

“Damn right it’s not,” said Ron. “What kind of lunatic needs all this? There’re more clothes here than in the bloody shops.”

“No, I meant that there should be more recent styles. This isn’t all of it.”

“Harry, mate. There are about five hundred robes in here and you think that’s not _enough_?”

They made it all the way to the back of the wardrobe. Harry put his palm on the wall there, thinking.

“Let’s focus on the bedroom,” he said to Ron, and turned, halting abruptly. The door to exit the wardrobe was right behind him. “Huh?”

“Oh,” said Ron. “Weird.”

They left with alacrity.

“Since we’re talking,” Harry said, as they combed the bedroom, “I’ve a question for you. How come the Burrow doesn’t have any house-elves?”

“Oh.” A drawer opened. Ron’s Disillusioned hand held up an embroidered handkerchief to the light in brief examination, dropped it again. “I asked Mum that when I was little, actually. She told me to stop bothering her and to go help Percy shut up the ghoul, it was banging around so loudly. So I went to ask Bill instead, and Bill said that he thought it was because the house got torn down too many times. This old nutter, my great-great-great-uncle, or some such, had this ‘vision’ that he wanted to fulfill, and he kept wanting to rebuild it. And then Charlie came over and said that no no, it was because there were _two_ of them — him and his brother — and they kept arguing over where they wanted each room, and redoing bits, and it sort of broke the house for a generation. And then Mum overheard and said she had enough to bother with without worrying about the house growing extra mouths that needed feeding, and that was that.”

That fit with what Harry knew. “I used to wonder —“ he paused awkwardly — “er. Why some wizards and witches lived in smaller places, if space dilation was so commonplace.”

There was a stretch of silence where Ron may have given him a look, if both of them were not mostly invisible. “You mean why I’m not a prick like Malfoy, living in a bloody palace.”

“Er. Well. So I asked Draco, and he said it was because space dilation was strictly regulated, and was difficult to implement in a way that would last. He said a bunch of stuff actually; it was long and convoluted and I don’t remember it all. Anyway, the point seemed to be that while say, expanding the inside of a bag is easy enough by yourself, the spell would wear off eventually, sooner rather than later. A proper expandable bag purchased from an artisan would be much more reliable, because the spell would have been stitched into the bag while it was being made, and so on. And houses were even more complicated; something like Malfoy Manor was coaxed to grow almost like a living thing, and what’s more you couldn’t hire outsiders to do it for you. The Malfoys had to do it themselves; they had to be the artisan, learn the spells and etch in the runic anchors, place the walls down stone by stone, and then hold the magic while it learnt to balance, and if anything went wrong then it was their own lives in danger from the ceiling collapsing. And all of it would have taken a lot of time, generations of it, and therefore a lot of money. They could afford it because they’re the wizarding equivalent of landed gentry.”

“Okay,” said Ron slowly. “And?”

Harry levitated a bookshelf to check behind it. “I was just thinking, that’s all. This house has lived for a long time. We only saw a part of the wardrobe; it didn’t want to show us the rest. I don’t think it’s because it was trying to hide something from us. It feels almost like it was telling us that there was nothing in there we needed to bother with.”

“And what about all those rooms we searched already?”

“I don’t know. The house is hurt. A lot of the doors opened to blank walls. Maybe it was trying. Maybe its remaining power is concentrated nearest to the core rooms. That makes sense, doesn’t it?”

“Don’t ask me. If that’s the case, why can’t it tell us exactly where to look?”

Right as he finished speaking, the curtain closest to the fire twitched.

They both fell completely silent.

The curtain twitched again.

Harry groped through the air and found Ron’s arm. Together, they stepped slowly towards the far window. When Harry judged them near enough, he jerked the curtain back with a spell.

Nothing. Just the black of night. Paranoid that they’d revealed their position to any Death Eaters outside, he hurriedly let it fall closed again.

The remains of the fire crackled and hissed.

“Shh,” Harry murmured. “Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?” Ron asked anxiously.

The fire hissed again. It sounded almost like a word.

“Shh,” Harry repeated, dragging Ron with him toward the fireplace. Was that even possible? Was the Manor trying to say something?

“_… here …_“

“It said ‘here,’” Harry told Ron.

“What?” Ron stopped walking. “Harry, I don’t hear anything.”

“Not ‘hear,’” Harry corrected impatiently. “_Here_. H-E-R-E.”

Wait.

How had he known that so specifically, without context?

“_Someone’s … here …_“ said the fire.

“Someone’s here,” Harry repeated. “We need to hide.”

“What? You’re not making any sense.”

“Go back and hide in the wardrobe.” Harry pushed Ron away. “I’m just going to check the fireplace.”

“Harry, stop —“

“_Sleepy … hungry … food … food …_“

Quite suddenly, Harry remembered the dead chicken underneath the table, and also under what circumstances he had previously heard disembodied voices.

It wasn’t the fire that was hissing.

From underneath the couch closest to the grate slid the diamond-patterned form of Nagini.

By the catch of breath several paces behind Harry, Ron had seen her too.

Green and gold and bronze she was in the firelight, a magnificent thing. She had grown larger since Harry had last seen her in the graveyard; her neck was about as thick as his own, now, and the girth of the rest of her gave him no doubt as to whether she could swallow an adult human whole. She must have been coiled tightly indeed underneath the couches to fit.

“_Hungry …_“

She headed straight for the chicken. It had been left for her, or by her, as a snack for later. Later was now. The sight of her open maw was mesmerising.

Harry snapped out of it.

As Nagini began to ease the chicken into her mouth, he opened his backpack.

At the sound of the zipper, Nagini paused. So did Harry.

“_Who’s there?_“ she said, and there was a tone to the query. Harry might have called it languid in another creature. “_I can taste the two of you in the air._“

Moving an inch at a time, Harry drew his Firebolt out. The Disillusionment Charm on it had worn off. Just as well. That meant Ron could see what he intended. He stepped backward.

“_Where did the master go?_“

Harry got on the broom, and a second later felt Ron’s weight settle in behind him. He kicked off.

“_Food first._“

The room was practically palatial in height. He judged that if Nagini were stretched from head to tail, she would just about make the distance from floor to ceiling. He rose as high as possible. Could she jump? She seemed much too heavy and legless for that.

From above, they had a good view of the length of her body, but not her head, which was obscured by the table. There were some sounds of crunching and — stretching, Harry supposed, he didn’t know what to call it — and then a very satisfied hiss.

“That thing killed Dad,” Ron said, voice forced so quiet all the emotion had been flattened out. He had a hand on Harry’s shoulder. It was shaking.

Harry looked carefully away from the form of the snake to make sure he spoke English, and said, “There’s a wrapped basilisk fang in my backpack. Can you take it out?”

“_Why did you go up there?_“ hissed Nagini curiously, coming out from underneath the table. Her neck was distended, but even as they watched, her inner muscles shifted, and the chicken was pushed further down. “_If the master sent you to groom me, you had best come down now, before I grow impatient._“

“Ron,” Harry said again, closing his eyes this time. “The fang, please.”

“No,” said Ron. “I can do you one better. _Avada Kedavra!_“

Harry had enough time to think disbelievingly that it couldn’t be that easy, and then, as Nagini dodged away in a flash almost faster than he could follow, knew that it wouldn’t be. Of course not.

“_You dare try to harm me? ME?_“

She rose upward, higher and higher, taller and taller, and Harry understood two things.

One: he was not very good at mentally measuring snakes by using rooms as rulers.

Two: she did not need to jump.

He swerved violently and desperately out of the way, and Ron, thank god, did not scream. Harry didn’t think that the thick wooden doors would completely block that amount of noise.

But noise or no noise, they couldn’t afford to drag this out. Didn’t she have some sort of direct connection to Voldemort? She could alert him to what was happening at any moment.

Luckily, it seemed like she was not yet aware or suspicious of their identity, enraged though she was by their actions. That meant it was all the more crucial he did not give himself away by speaking Parseltongue.

Neither, unfortunately, could he take his eyes off her to speak English. Well, he had already told Ron about the basilisk fang. That had to be enough.

“_Avada Kedavra!_“ Ron cast again.

Nagini dodged. Something about the motion suggested a hint of laziness, almost arrogance, but the chicken was still lodged in her throat, and as Harry rolled away from her lunge, he wondered if it were not laziness but lethargy. What did snakes do after feeding? Didn’t they lie still to rest and digest? He’d seen a documentary once on television. Eating made snakes vulnerable, he recalled. Because it slowed them down.

This information did not seem particularly useful at present. If this was Nagini being slow, he did not want to experience her being fast.

“Hold still for a sec,” said Ron.

This was such a ludicrous suggestion that Harry forgot himself and blurted out: “_What?_“

In front of him, Nagini halted in the middle of drawing back for another lunge and replied, head tilted, “_What? Did you speak?_“

Behind him, Ron said, “Good, almost got it … there. The fang.”

“_Fuck_,” Harry swore. It came out as a garbled hiss. Nagini, if anything, appeared more puzzled.

He couldn’t give her time to consider the implications. He flew directly at her while she was still hesitating, and his gamble paid off; this time she swerved to avoid him, hissing with surprise and confusion. He felt more certain she was unbalanced by both the lump of chicken and the fact that she had to stretch so high to reach them.

She fell and caught herself, then endeavoured to rise up and resettle. He turned sharply, one of Ron’s arms a vice around his waist, and shot towards her again. And again. And again. Each time she tried to right herself, he made her fall closer to the ground. Instinct told him that if he let up at all she would strike, so he didn’t. And all the while he eyed the swell under her skin, which was no longer moving towards her stomach, but going back in the other direction.

“_Stop_,” she said finally, weakly. “_I must rest._“ And with a great heave she began to vomit the chicken.

Harry closed his eyes. “Now, Ron!” He dived.

Ron drove the basilisk fang through Nagini’s head like a stake.

If a hiss could be a scream, then Nagini screamed.

Harry had meant to pull out of the dive, but it had been a risky angle, and he had Ron’s extra weight to contend with. They hit the ground hard and rolled, crashing into the bed.

Nagini was still screaming, wordless. Her whip of a tail thrashed and knocked over the bookshelf, then cracked clean through one of the bed posts.

Ron cast, for the third time, “_Avada Kedavra_.”

He’d aimed for the thickest part of her. It connected.

All movement ceased.

She was dead.

Harry knew it, as well as he knew anything. Ron had not been lacking in hate or conviction, and the Killing Curse when well delivered suffered no leeway. Nagini’s left eye stared at them unseeing. Nearby, the regurtitated chicken lay obscenely in the middle of the rug, covered in slime.

All at once, Harry was aware of the smell: the chicken, the dead snake, their own perspiration.

“Fuck,” he hissed again, but in English, and heard a far-off echo.

Not an echo. Death Eaters, calling to one another.

Ron had heard it, too. They got up. Harry put away the Firebolt. They renewed their Disillusionment Charms and bolted for the door.

There was cacophany outside, both above and below. Shouting, running, glass breaking. It was impossible to sort out in the brief second they got before they had to make a decision: which way?

“Down,” Harry declared.

Above them, someone yelled, “He’s dead, I’m telling you.”

“He isn’t dead, he’s gone!” shouted someone else.

Then, from below them: “There was a crash from the third floor. Yes, Amycus, I’m sure.” An indecipherable response. “Don’t ask _me_! Go and check!”

Harry and Ron flattened themselves against the bannisters. In the next instant, a squat wizard appeared around the turn. He was huffing and puffing, and set to the next flight of stairs with his yellowing teeth bared. He didn’t notice them as he passed.

As they waited for him to be out of sight, Harry put his hand in his robe pocket: the coin inside was hot to the touch. That wasn’t unexpected; it must have been well past the hour by now. He felt along the coin’s top edge, counting. One distinct ridge meant there was nothing to report. Two meant that something had been found. Three was danger and a call to abort. Four was the signal that the other party had been separated. Five meant mission success and was an order for everyone to leave.

There were two ridges. But even as he rubbed at it, frowning, the coin was infused with heat again and suddenly there were four ridges. Then, just as quickly, there were three.

The coast was clear. Harry pulled Ron down onto the second floor, and, throwing caution to the wind, darted into the first room he found. Fortunately, it was one of the abandoned ones. A bit of light leaked in from the corridor.

“I just checked the coin,” he said urgently into Ron’s ear. “It had several messages in a row. They found something, and they got separated, and we need to leave.”

“No shit,” Ron replied in the cheerful tones of a man accepting doom, as from elsewhere in the house another crash sounded. “What should we do? Go down to the first floor?”

“I’m not sure, I think we —“

“Alecto! Alecto! Get up here! The fucking snake is dead!”

Another set of footsteps, pounding up the stairs.

“First floor,” Harry said, as it passed.

The second floor corridor was deformed; the walls did not quite meet the floor at proper right angles, and instead sloped first this way and then the other. Narcissa’s function room was here, unsearched, but there was no time. Harry and Ron hurried on downward.

The stairs desposited them right into the middle of the first floor drawing room.

Harry was so taken aback he stopped on the landing, and Ron nearly tripped over him. The drawing room was one of the core rooms, but it had certainly never contained stairs before. All of the furniture it had originally held was gone, or smashed into pieces and pushed up against the walls. In the centre of the room was an immense black table he had never seen before. A number of messily placed chairs surrounded it.

On the table was a body lying face up; it was very still. Even from the stairs, Harry recognised it.

It was Theodore Nott.

Some floors above, there was more yelling.

“This way,” Harry said, and steered Ron around the stairs towards the windows on the right. No time to work the latch; he Vanished a pane of glass. They jumped into the bushes below.

A branch ripped his sleeve, then caught in his hair. He cursed and tore it out, staggering as Ron pulled him upright. As he stood, all energy drained out of him. He was so tired. What was the point, anyway? Theo was dead. Nagini had been discovered. This had been a futile, disastrous attempt at the impossible. Voldemort was coming, and there was no escape for any of them. Already, his bones ached with cold. Death was cold. Voldemort would come for them, just like he had come for Harry’s mother, made her scream …

His mother, screaming …

“Harry!” said Ron desperately. “It’s Dementors! _Move_.”

“No,” Harry said, but did move as Ron pulled at him. He looked behind them. Illuminated by the light from the house, two Dementors approached from across the ruined lawn. As he watched, another bled from the darkness to join them.

“Cast your Patronus,” Ron was pleading.

He couldn’t cast his Patronus. It would give away their position. That seemed like a logical decision. He took a deep breath and tried to think. “Our brooms.”

“Merlin, that’s right,” said Ron.

His mother was shrill and terrified; she loved him so much and yet that too filled him with despair, because it was her love that had killed her. He thought fiercely that it would have been better if she’d never loved him, if she’d only run and kept on running.

Ron slapped him hard across his face. “Get on your broom!”

Harry got on his broom.

“_Fly_,” shouted Ron.

They flew.

The cold receded. Just a little. Enough.

“The stables,” Harry croaked, throat dry.

They cut through the air. It didn’t take long. He saw the silver glow of a Patronus as soon as he landed, and felt its comforting touch on his heart as they dashed to the stall.

“Hermione?” he said, as her otter glided into full view.

“Harry,” came her relieved voice, and then he could see her; she’d undone the Disillusionment Charm. She appeared dishevelled but unhurt. “Oh, thank god. You never updated your side of the coin; I was so worried. Is Ron with you?”

“I’m here,” said Ron. “We got your messages.”

“What happened? Where’s Draco?” Harry demanded.

“We got separated,” Hermione said, as she took out large bars of chocolate from her bag. Harry accepted one and broke off a piece to chew. “We found Theo, and he said he knew where the cup was, but then the Death Eaters found us.”

“You found Theo? But he was on the first floor. Dead.”

“What?” Hermione stared at him. “No, that can’t be — we found Theo on the fifth floor. He was alive.”

“How long ago was that? We saw his body not five minutes ago.”

“It was —“ Hermione’s breath was coming short and shallow — “it was a while ago, Harry. I don’t know. Thirty minutes, maybe. Maybe less. Maybe Theo — I don’t know. But Malfoy was with him when we got separated. They shot an unblockable curse at us and Malfoy, he pushed me out of the way, and then I lost track of him, and we split up. I only got here a short while before you did. That’s when I updated the coin.”

“Then we’ll wait here. Draco knows he needs to meet back up with us —“

“Harry, Hermione,” interrupted Ron shakily. “The Dementors …”

The otter was growing weaker. Hermione’s eyes were wide with fear.

“Okay,” Harry said with icy, forced calm. “This is what we’re going to do. Don’t argue. You two will get to safety. I’m going back for Draco.”

“We’ll go with you —“

“No. Don’t argue. Get on your brooms and leave. Get out of the wards and apparate back to Hogwarts. If you want to help, get Pansy and see if you can’t create another distraction for us elsewhere.”

“Harry —“

“Hermione,” said Ron. “He’s right, we don’t have time —“

“I’m leaving now,” Harry said, mounting his Firebolt again. “You won’t see me well enough to follow me, so don’t bother trying. Ron, take her and go.”

Hermione got on her broom grimly, defeated. She said, “We separated on the fifth floor, on the eastern side. There’s a room with a hole in the wall. You might be able to enter from there.” She tapped her wand over her head and disappeared.

The otter shuddered, as though it, too, felt the cold, and winked out completely.

Harry shoved at the ground; it was the most graceless takeoff he had ever made. Terror grew jaws and snapped at his insides, and he didn’t know how much of it was the Dementors and how much was simply himself.

He could see _Lumos_ lights all throughout the Manor, now, darting in and out of view. Nagini had been found. Voldemort was likely coming. How much time did he have?

Moreover, what was he thinking? How could he expect to find Draco on a time limit in such a large area? He should have stayed at the stables and waited, but it was too late now. Theo was dead, and that meant that Draco could also be —

He turned. The Dementors were closer than he had thought. The palms of his hands were sweaty, and his grip was slipping. Teeth chattering, he rose higher and away, fumbling at his pocket for another piece of chocolate. It wasn’t enough. He should summon his Patronus. But if he did, he’d be spotted immediately.

It was so difficult to think clearly. Draco couldn’t be — he had to be fine. The fact that there was still so much commotion in the house surely counted for something. The Death Eaters were searching, too. And — and when he and Ron had been escaping, they’d heard crashing coming from the upper levels. If Hermione had already been down by the stables at that point, then it meant that it was likely that Draco had been causing trouble for them very recently.

He ate another piece of chocolate. Good. That train of thought was good. He leaned forward and picked up speed.

A hole in the wall, Hermione had said. He couldn’t find it at first glance, so he chose a random window on the eastern side of the fifth floor instead. He landed on a small bed. The mattress reeked of piss and something intrinsically animal.

“— perfectly secure,” said a voice. “The Dark Lord will not be pleased to learn of this failure. He was under _your_ watch, Carrow.”

“_I_ wanted to put him in the dungeons,” came the resentful reply. Harry recognised the voice from earlier. What was her name? Alec-something. Alecto.

“He spent most of his time unconscious and insensible from the pain. You have no one to blame for his escape and subsequent death except yourself.”

“The rat was watching him. How was I supposed to know?”

The voices were getting louder. The man Alecto was speaking to made a noise of consideration. A door opened, didn’t close. They’d gone into the adjacent room.

The man said, “That was unwise. Pettigrew is a coward and a sneak by nature; he cannot be trusted with any task. No doubt he will appear again in a week’s time with some unlikely story to buy the Dark Lord’s favour.”

“No doubt,” said Alecto bitterly. “But the snake wasn’t my fault. That wasn’t my watch, Yaxley.”

“No,” said Yaxley sweetly. “It was your brother’s.”

“Stupid task, guarding a giant snake. As if it needed guarding.”

“Apparently, it did.”

“No one in their right mind would think to try and kill that monster. We can’t have anticipated that.”

“Your job wasn’t to anticipate, you fool. It was to do as instructed. To be where you were supposed to be. You and your brother have cost us the lives of one of our own, and the Dark Lord’s familiar —“

“A useless boy and a pet snake.”

“A boy whom the Dark Lord was not finished with, and a prized weapon. To make it worse, one killed the other.”

“You think the boy killed the snake?” scoffed Alecto. “Yaxley, there was an accomplice. Crabbe said that he saw a shadow, and the Dementors are agitated.”

“You are a fool twice over if you believe —“

“_You_ were the one in charge of the dungeons,” Alecto said.

“Enough!” exclaimed Yaxley. “If there were an accomplice, they did not come from the dungeons. Challenge me on that again, Carrow, and I will make you regret it.”

Alecto’s reply was indistinct.

It seemed to satisfy Yaxley. “There’s no one in here. Search the next.”

Harry slipped out before they could cross paths. This corridor was only wide enough to walk single file. Some of the rooms it opened into had doorways but no doors. Some of the doorways were barred. A few of these contained bodies, mostly curled up in a corner, but none of them were the right shape to be Draco. The ammonic smell of human and animal waste was strong.

Where could Draco have gone? What had he done? Why had he not gone to the stables after separating from Hermione? Jumping out a window was easy enough, and it was apparent from the conversation Harry had overheard that Draco had not been caught. Yet. So what did that leave?

He could have been injured and unable to move. He could be unconscious somewhere underneath Harry’s Cloak. Or — Hermione had said that Theo had claimed to know where the cup was. Would Draco be so reckless…?

He was some distance away now from Yaxley and Alecto. The smell was overwhelming. He slowed and put the torn sleeve of his robe against his nose, trying not to gag or cough.

Something odd was on the floor.

Everytime he’d stayed over at Malfoy Manor in the past, Narcissa had always put him in what they all called the blue room, which was near Draco’s own. During his first visit, it had indeed just been one room, albeit much bigger than Harry was used to. Later on, it had grown into a suite of rooms, but no matter how spacious it became it always retained the same style of decor. The floor was ever a soft wooden grey, the walls the sort of deep heartache blue the sky became just before the sun rose. The very last time he had slept in it, during the Easter holidays of fourth year, there had been another extra detail: once in a while, a school of small silver fish would swim across the walls. He’d liked it, because it had reminded him of the Slytherin dormitories.

And now, there was a small silver fish, just as he remembered, on the dirty stone floor in front of him. Harry blinked. Light gleamed from its tiny scales.

He’d suggested to Ron that the house might help them, not fully believing it himself. Yet what else could this be?

He took a step forward. The fish moved. Another step. The fish swam in a circle around his feet and flashed ahead. It was fast. He checked the Silencing Charm on his feet and ran.

The fish lead him to a staircase — it was likely the same staircase from earlier, but on this storey it was narrow and rickety. The same vicious crack he had seen before on the third floor was here, too, carved into the rotting wood. The fish swam up next to it. Tentatively, he set a foot down on the lowest step. It creaked, despite the Silencing Charm.

“Can you make it _not_ do that?” he demanded of the fish, and instantly felt like an idiot. Why was he talking to the house? Why was he _talking_, when he needed to be quiet?

The trip up the stairs took a lifetime. He could hear people moving around on the floor above, and did not want to chance the opposite: their hearing him. When he finally made it, he had to duck immediately into a room to avoid being run over by a sprinting Death Eater. Goyle looked a lot like his son, Gregory. Fortunately, he was making far too much noise of his own to detect Harry.

He was yelling, “What are they doing up here? They should be down at the dungeons! Where’s Yaxley? Find him.”

A flash of light. The fish. It swam up the wall in front of Harry and darted back out of the room.

He didn’t have to go much further. They turned a corner, and Harry knew where they were. Lucius Malfoy’s study. The polished door with its gleaming handle was completely out of place in the shabby surrounds. The fish slipped into the keyhole, and the door opened on its own.

The study was the only room so far that still looked mostly unchanged. The numerous bookshelves and cabinets were undisturbed, the leather seats gleamed, and the potted plants were healthy. Everything was in its place, save for the desk. It had been shifted forward and away, and now sat at an odd angle to the wall behind it.

Where the desk should have sat was a hole in the floor. Steps going down. It was dark.

Flashing silver, the fish vanished.

Harry didn’t hesitate.

The steps were steep, so he didn’t rush. He counted ten of them before he reached the bottom. It was pitch black. He put out hand to get his bearings —

“_Stupefy!_“

The last thing he saw in the red light of the Stunning Spell was, absurdly, a pile of gold.


	30. Chapter 30

“Nott, you fucking cretin.” Draco’s voice.

“I revived him, didn’t I? You said to get ready in case it was Death Eaters, how I was supposed to know —“

Harry groaned. Felt his head. He’d fallen against the steps and introduced the back of his skull to a corner.

“Harry?” said Draco. He sounded far away.

“Fuck,” Harry said, struggling to stand. “I’d better not be hallucinating. Draco. It’s really you?”

“It’s me,” Draco replied. “Harry, don’t move. Don’t come in.”

“Why not?” Harry asked, still somewhat dazed.

“It’s the cup,” Theo’s voice said. “It’s cursed.”

“_Lumos_,” Harry cast.

The chamber was about the length and width of the interior of a Muggle bus. The walls were lined with locked cabinets, and the floor was covered with a hundreds of golden cups stamped with the sigil of a badger.

Draco was leaning against the far corner. Actually leaning against it, like he was having trouble holding himself up. A trickle of drying blood was running down the side of his face. Theo was closer to Harry. His feet were positioned awkwardly to not touch any of the cups around him. Scrunched in his hands was Harry’s Invisibility Cloak. Both of them were covered in burns.

“Right,” Harry said, once the dramatic pause wore itself out. “Explain.”

“I’d planned this for weeks,” Theo began to say. “I manipulated Carrow into sending me Pettigrew, and I —“

“Nott,” said Draco loudly, “was trying to escape when we found him.” Theo fell silent. Draco continued in a lower voice: “He said he knew where the cup was, so I went with him after we accidentally separated from Granger. We came here; the Manor let us in, as I assume it did for you. The Dark Lord thinks that only he can open the door, and so do the rest of them, so they haven’t bothered trying to get in.” He gestured. “The cup was cursed. Touch it and it multiplies and burns. Same for the copies. And it’s a Horcrux, so it can’t be Summoned, nor levitated.”

Harry stared in dismay. “So we don’t know which one is the real one?”

“We do, actually,” Theo said, pointing. “The one that’s upside-down, right there.”

There were no obvious visual indicators that that particular cup was special. “Are you sure?”

“Can’t you feel it?” Theo asked. “The malevolence. Draco and I both can.”

Harry concentrated. “I … maybe?”

“The longer we’re here, the more sure of it I am. It’s that one.”

“Then let’s grab it and go. Let it multiply. I’ll hold onto it. Just run. We’ll figure it out.”

“No,” said Draco. “You don’t know how fast it multiplies. Too many wrong moves and we’ll be crushed to death in here. I’ve been trying to figure it out, and you’re just what I need to solve it. But you must do exactly as I say.”

Theo said, “Draco had some sort of — episode, earlier. He fell when we were being chased, and I think he hit his head pretty hard. Which shouldn’t be a problem, but then he fell again when we were coming down those steps, and he’s been … unwell, since. So we’ve been stuck here. I’m not sure he can manage running from where he is without —“

“Shut up, Nott,” said Draco, insouciant. He turned his line of sight back to Harry. “Do you have your Firebolt with you?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

“You fell?”

“It was the vertigo. Take out your broom.”

Harry did so. “What happened to yours?”

“_Accio Potter’s Firebolt_.” It stopped neatly in the air before Draco. “My bag got buried underneath an avalanche of Hufflepuff. Very tragic. I’d Summon it, but I don’t want to risk unbalancing anything and causing any further accidents. But never mind that. Listen closely. I’m going to get on the broom. I will fly over and grab the real cup. I will throw it at you, Harry, and you are going to catch it in your backpack. In there, I hope, it shouldn’t count as being in contact with a lifeform, and therefore shouldn’t multiply. But even if it does, there’s enough space in there to last us at least until we can get out. As soon as you’ve caught the cup, run up the steps. I’ll grab Theo and follow. Okay?”

It seemed like a good plan. “Okay,” Harry said.

“Yeah,” said Theo.

Draco levered himself onto the broom. Despite his best efforts, one leg brushed against a cup. A dozen more sprung from it, even within that small frame of contact.

Harry held the backpack ready. Draco tilted the broom, reached down.

It was like someone had turned on the tap to an invisible waterfall. The moment Draco’s fingers touched the base of the cup, copies began to pour from it. Draco held firm. Now that he was closer, Harry could see that he was soaked in sweat, barely holding himself from collapse. Still, when he threw the cup, his aim was true.

Harry caught it, zipped the backpack closed. No clanging sound of multiplication escaped, which was a marvellous sign. Draco was already reaching for Theo. Harry turned to go up the steps.

This time, the cold despair hit him like a blow.

He slipped: physically, mentally. Lily Potter screamed. Sirius Black walked backwards into his end. Draco Malfoy fell, covered in blood. All of them, every single person Harry had ever cared about was dying, dying, and it was his fault.

He went deep inside himself, frantic, racing through his maze of memories. Here, well beyond any Occlumency walls. Here, where things could be kept safe. What had Lupin told him? What he needed was always here, golden and bright like a Snitch, and Harry was a Seeker.

He found it, caught it, held it dear. It would never leave him. It was a part of him; the best part. He said: “_Expecto Patronum!_“

His stag charged, blazing as only it could.

Behind, Draco was limp on the broom. Theo had tripped into the cups, and they were rising like a tide.

“Get on the broom!” Harry commanded him.

Theo tried, but he had to do too much; he could not keep Draco balanced and clamber up himself, and the cups were up to his waist, now.

“Just grab it,” Harry yelled, desperate. “The handle. Grab on. Hold Draco. Don’t let go. _Accio Firebolt_.”

Miraculously, it worked. He pulled them up with the spell, up the steps, up back into the study. The flood of fake cups stopped as soon as Theo and Draco were out of reach. They’d nearly filled the chamber. Harry helped Theo stand.

Theo’s eyes were wide and bloodshot. He pushed at Harry’s shoulder, pointing.

There were about thirty Dementors outside the windows. Frost lined the glass. Harry’s stag stood alone, facing them, antlers poised for attack.

“How’s your Patronus, Theo?” Harry asked, laying a steadying hand on Draco’s back. “Practised much, lately?”

“It’s — it’s a salamander,” Theo said, shivering. “But they took my wand. The one I have right now belonged to Pettigrew, and it doesn’t work very well.”

“Well — try.”

_Thud_. The Manor groaned. Something or someone was pounding on the door.

Harry swore, closed his eyes. They had one broom, three people. One broom? He had an idea, and went back to the steps. “_Accio Draco’s bag_.”

He felt the spell hook onto something, and experienced a momentary surge of hope. But it didn’t work: the cups jostled against one another, and refused to budge any further. The bag was buried far too deeply.

_Thud_.

“We have two options,” Theo said. He hadn’t managed to bring forth his Patronus. “Option one: if we consider a broader perspective, I have crucial information, while Draco isn’t necessary for —“

“No,” Harry cut in coldly, furiously. He met Theo’s eyes and made sure Theo knew that he meant it.

Theo didn’t look surprised. “Option two: we enlarge the Firebolt so it can fit three. But it’s likely that it will significantly impact the broom’s speed, and in the worst case scenario, its ability to fly at all.”

_Thud_.

“We can’t duplicate it, can we,” Harry said, already knowing the answer.

“You can copy the form of a magical object, but not the function. Same reason why we needed the real cup.”

_Thud_.

“_Engorgio_,” Harry cast. He let it grow as large as he dared. Out of proportion, now, the broom looked ungainly. Swinging his leg over, he felt a discontented buzzing in the wood. No time to worry about that. He grabbed Draco by the waist and tried to position him properly, then gave up and cast a Sticking Charm between them. To Theo, he said tersely, “Get on.”

_THUD_.

“Hurry!” Harry snapped.

Theo scrambled on.

When the Firebolt had been released, much ado had been made about its streamlined and aerodynamic frame which had been handcrafted twig by twig to coax out the best from the latest state of the art flight and acceleration charms. Under optimal conditions, the Firebolt was advertised to accelerate from zero to maximum velocity in three-point-six seconds. Before he had experienced it himself, Harry had obsessively read all of Spudmore’s interviews on the revolutionary design and dreamed of just how fast he would go. Later, he hadn’t been disappointed.

They were far from optimal conditions now. The broom glided forward at slightly faster than walking pace. It seemed to be picking up speed bit by bit, but the change was too slow to be meaningful.

The door burst open. It made a shattering sound, like it was composed of crystal instead of wood, and as it gave in the Manor groaned again. Theo made a high-pitched, panicked noise. But Harry saw him raise Pettigrew’s wand to conjure a shield, even as the Death Eaters poured in and began firing curses.

Harry’s stag still shone. It stamped at the ground.

“_Evanesco_,” Harry said to the glass.

The stag charged.

Harry tipped the broom straight down and urged it to give in to gravity.

They were right above Narcissa’s ruined rose garden. Not all of her night-blooming roses had been destroyed, and the few remaining ones gave off enough of a glimmer that he could use them to judge the distance between narrow escape and fatal capture. The Firebolt complained as he pulled out of the dive, the buzzing growing more pronounced beneath his fingers.

“Come on,” he said. “Come on. Please.”

With great strain, they levelled and didn’t lose all their speed. But they still weren’t going fast enough to outstrip the Dementors.

“_Expecto Patronum_,” Theo was casting. “_Expecto Patronum_.” A silver glow only.

At this rate, they would be surrounded before they reached the edge of the property.

Draco stirred.

“Draco?” Harry said. “Draco. Draco!”

Nothing. But then: “Don’t shout, Potter. Merlin, fuck. I saw … What the fuck happened?”

“We’re in the air,” Harry told him fatalistically. “Being chased by Dementors. It’s very possible we’re not going to make it. There’s chocolate in my left pocket, if you want some.”

“Really?” said Theo, in the tones of a man offered a feast before the gallows. “You have chocolate?”

They all had some. Harry glanced behind. The Dementors were approaching from above, at an angle. The stag ran ahead of the horde, occasionally turning around to drive one or two away, but the horde was too persistent and too many for it to disperse alone.

“Let me steer,” said Draco.

The clouds had cleared somewhat, and between the wavering moonlight and the stag’s luminescence, Harry could make out the shadow of forest beneath them. Draco veered them to the right, leaning down so steeply to scrutinise the land that Harry, still stuck to him, had to do the same.

“There,” Draco said, pointing to nothing at all, and without any more warning took them into another dive.

They landed in a cloud of dead leaves and broken branches. Harry tried to dismount one way and Draco the other, and both of them fell, winded, pushing at each other and the ground and Theo until Harry had the presence of mind to undo the Sticking Charm.

“This way,” Draco panted, breath misting in the unnaturally chill air. “Quick.”

They ran. Out of the corner of his eyes, Harry saw flashes of the stag and fluttering scraps of black, bits of dead skin and, for one terrifying second, a skeletal, shriveled mouth bared in ghastly greeting.

And then suddenly the speckled canopy was gone, replaced by open sky, and it was warmer, and they were alone.

Ahead of them, the winged ouroboros twisted the around the archway that heralded the entrance to the Malfoy mausoleum.

***

“Don’t go underneath the archway, Potter,” Draco said, as though he thought Harry didn’t know that, and before Harry could reply, added, more reasonably, “But we should stay near it; it’s the anchor for the wards.”

So they sat down wearily next to the arch, under the gaze of the ouroboros. With a lack of hesitation that spoke to his utter exhaustion, Draco lay down on the dirt. Harry offered him the last of the chocolate, and turned to Theo. “You have my Cloak.”

“What?” Theo said. Then, “Oh. Yeah. It’s yours?” He’d tucked it into the fold of his robes. Harry took it back, feeling a startling flare of possessiveness.

He bundled it together and offered it to Draco. Draco looked at him, uncomprehending. “Pillow,” Harry clarified.

Draco made a noise in the back of his throat and crawled over to place his head on Harry’s lap instead. His hair was dark with sweat; Harry tucked it out of the way.

“I should heal those burns,” he said softly.

“In a moment,” Draco muttered, closing his eyes.

Theo coughed. “That cloak is amazing. Where’d you get it? Do you know who made it? The quality of the charmwork is unlike any I’ve seen before.”

“It’s a family heirloom,” Harry told him shortly.

“I’d love to take a closer look at it.”

“Noted.”

Theo shifted positions so that he was facing Harry head-on. “Did I do something to piss you off?”

“No.”

“If it’s about my suggestion earlier —“

“Shut up.”

“— I only meant to present you with the logical options. The circumstances were exceptional.”

Harry glowered at him. “I don’t care. Whatever, Nott. Since you’re feeling talkative, I have some questions. How did you know where the cup was? Did you get back your memories?”

“My memories?”

“You Obliviated yourself, some time ago now.”

Theo looked both intrigued and confused. “And why do you know that?”

“How did you know where the cup was?”

“I worked it out, in between the torture and the boredom. There was nothing else to set my mind to, back there. Other than escape.”

“I saw your dead body in the drawing room.”

Theo smiled rather unpleasantly. “That was Pettigrew.”

“You killed him?”

“What would you have done in my place?”

Harry shrugged. “Save it. I’m not judging you. I want to figure out which side you’re on. Last I saw you, you were convinced that Volde —“

“Don’t say it!” Theo yelled.

“You were convinced that _he_ was undefeatable,” Harry finished. “What changed?”

Theo stared at him. “Nothing changed. They were killing me slowly. He said it was punishment for not finding the locket and letting you get away at the pawn shop. But I could tell they were doing it for sport.”

“So you did it just to save yourself?”

“They were going to set the werewolves on me!” Theo spat. “It’s a full moon tomorrow night. This was my last chance. The only — the only good thing was that my father wasn’t — I didn’t drag him down. He spearheaded one of the raids, and was praised. He told me that his position was stable and that I should run. I didn’t want to. He insisted, and got me the Polyjuice. But still, I wouldn’t have, if — if they hadn’t …” An ugly expression took over his face. “Don’t pretend you’re so high and mighty, Potter.”

There was a dry, staccato noise. Draco had turned to the sky and was laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Theo demanded suspiciously.

“Everything,” Draco replied. “Are you going to betray us?”

“What? No, I —“

“After all that, I think you owe Potter a life debt. Or maybe me. Perhaps both of us.”

Theo’s eyes became flinty. “Without your interference, I might not have gone to get the cup. I would have escape undetected.”

“Would you have? Without a reliable wand and no means of transportation?”

Scoffing, Theo deflected with, “We’re not even out of danger yet. We can’t stay here forever.”

“No,” Draco said. “I suppose not.”

Harry started. “The coin!”

Mercifully, it was still in his pocket. It was cold to the touch; Hermione had not updated it.

He hadn’t dismissed the stag; it was a good source of light, not to mention a comforting presence. He beckoned it over, and with a spark of inspiration tapped it on the head with his wand. “_Ystica_.” It looked at him inquiringly. “Please go and tell Hermione: Draco and I escaped with Theo, sort of. We’re hiding at the Malfoy mausoleum with one broom that can’t carry all of us properly.”

The stag touched its muzzle to his nose and trotted into nonbeing. Harry shivered.

Some part of him was expecting an immediate reply, but the minutes rolled by and none came. After a while, Draco sat up and allowed Harry to heal him. The cut on his head was shallow and easily dealt with, which wasn’t reassuring at all, because it only meant that it wasn’t the reason why Draco seemed so unwell. Harry offered to heal Theo too, but Theo declined.

They conjured water to drink, and drifted one by one to the edge of the clearing to relieve themselves. Both Draco and Theo slept. Harry was too wired to do so, and anyway one of them had to keep watch. Restlessly, he unzipped his backpack, then re-zipped it. Stupid; he’d been about to reach inside, forgetting that he could not risk touching the cup. Anyway, what was the use? All the little bits and pieces he’d brought — Weasley twin inventions, the matchsticks from Scrimgeour, Estelle’s portrait — none of it could help their situation. He couldn’t even attempt to destroy the cup, as he’d left the basilisk fang embedded in Nagini’s neck. Stupid. Why hadn’t he packed food? That would have been useful.

And then he remembered the small painting Dobby had given him. Carefully, he unzipped the pack again and murmured, “_Accio Dumbledore’s portrait_.”

The bag rustled. The painting deposited itself into his waiting hand.

The charm had worked, which meant that it really was Dumbledore’s portrait. But Dumbledore wasn’t there. There was only the placid blue background, and Draco’s _Knock Knock_ spell had no effect. Harry was about to shove it angrily away when he realised how clearly he could see.

The sun was rising.

“Harry?” Draco was awake.

“What should we do?” Harry said quietly. “Any ideas?”

Draco sat up, leaning against the arch. “We could transfigure some horses.”

Harry wasn’t sure if he was joking or not. “I don’t know how to ride a horse.”

“Oh.” Draco yawned. “Of course not, those Muggles didn’t teach you how to swim either.”

“Draco, most Muggles don’t actually teach their children horseriding.” 

“Don’t they?”

“I mean. Unless you lived on a farm or something.”

“Hm. Well, we could transfigure horses and you could ride with me.”

“Horses? Out of what we have here? Sticks?”

In answer, Draco pointed his wand at a rock on the ground and muttered an incantation. To Harry’s great surprise, it twitched and grew rapidly in size into an unmistakably equine shape. The horse, still a mottled grey, bent down to inspect their faces, snuffling, then trotted to the edge of the clearing in search for grass. It had barely taken its first mouthful when Draco waved his wand again and undid the spell.

“Why’d you get rid of it?”

“I just realised,” Draco said, “that a transfigured horse is an untrained horse, and probably won’t allow riders. Especially not inexperienced ones.”

“If only we had your Abraxans and Granians,” Harry said.

“That would be unspeakably convenient, yes,” Draco agreed. “But I rather hope they’ve escaped to somewhere safe, far away from here.”

“We could try Disillusionment and go slowly on the broom,” Harry said dispiritedly. “It can’t be that much further.”

Draco floated the Firebolt over. It quivered dangerously as it came. “I don’t know; I think you’ve ruined it. We’ll have to send it in for repairs later, if it can even be salvaged.” He hesitated. “I know it was a gift from Sirius.”

“Things are just things,” Harry said tiredly, even as he felt a pang.

Draco nodded, and shrunk the broom with a softly murmured spell.

***

The sun was sinking again before a reply to Harry’s Patronus message arrived. By then, all three of them were wide awake, having slept for most of the day (or, in Harry’s case, dozed intermittently). Harry was deliberating over sending Hermione another message and worrying about whether or not she and Ron had made it to safety when Hermione’s otter glided into their midst.

“Harry,” said the otter. “we’ve only just regrouped. A lot of people have been injured. Things on Pansy’s side didn’t go according to plan.” Hermione’s tone was brisk and businesslike, except where it shook slightly at the end of each sentence. “You-Know-Who came to Hogwarts. We fought as best as we could. He’s gone now, and we don’t know where. Either back to the Manor, or to the false safehouse location where he sent his Death Eaters. You need to leave. Go to the point on the property boundary where we entered, if you can. Some of us will meet you there; others will create a diversion elsewhere.”

The otter vanished.

“Fuck,” Harry said. Voldemort had gone to Hogwarts. The people at Hogwarts were supposed to be _safe_ — he took a deep breath. He had to focus.

“That’s it, then?” said Theo. “Just make a run for it?”

“If you have any better ideas,” Harry replied, “let’s hear it.” He didn’t say what he was really thinking, which was that neither Theo nor Draco looked like they were in a good enough condition to run anywhere.

Draco was casting _Point Me_. He moved to the edge of the clearing and said, “This way.”

The forest was purple in the fading dusk, the sound of insects overly loud. They walked in single file, one hand on the shoulder in front, the same way they had entered. Draco led the way under the Cloak; Harry and Theo followed behind, Disillusioned. In leaving the safety of the mausoleum, Harry had been braced for a tidal wave of cold despair — but the Dementors had dispersed.

As it grew darker, they moved slower and slower. A few times, Draco stopped to lean against a tree, and Harry wasn’t sure if it was because he needed to check their direction, or because he’d had another attack of vertigo. At other times, the uneven ground covered in roots and stones meant that they could only shuffle forward inch by agonising inch.

What might have been a brisk twenty to thirty minute walk in daylight took them at least three times as long. But they made it out onto the open field, where the Wiltshire wind was blowing as hard as it ever did, making the long blades of grass bend first this way, then the other.

Draco reached back and squeezed Harry’s arm. They still had quite some distance to cover. Luckily, now that there was more visibility and fewer obstacles, they could move somewhat faster.

Theo, behind them, made a sound. A displacement of breath, as though he had wanted to speak.

Moments later, Harry heard the first howl, and realised why he could see so well. Theo had told them: it was a full moon tonight, and there were no clouds in the sky.

A second howl answered the first. It sounded closer.

“We keep going,” Harry whispered, keeping his voice level.

They trampled their way through the grass. Harry could not help noticing that despite their general invisiblity, the fact of their physical bodies could not be more obvious: the parting grass marked their presence as clearly as a beacon to anyone close enough to see.

Another wolf howled. This time, the wind blowing at their back brought the sound right toward them, so it seemed as though the howl itself chased them across the field. The way was uphill now across an incline, becoming steeper as they climbed.

“You know what he likes to do,” Theo said, suddenly, “with a lot of the Muggles they capture. He releases them out here, on the fields, and lets the werewolves hunt them.”

“This isn’t very helpful,” Harry hissed.

“How much further?” Theo asked, fear pitching his voice higher.

They crested the top of the hill. Draco, who was breathing heavily, didn’t answer immediately. Harry took his bearings and said instead, “After the next hill, I think.”

It looked terribly far away. Behind them, the forest was a patch of darkness, yielding no comfort. Harry felt that at any moment a piece of it would break away and reveal itself to be a Death Eater, or worse.

Evidently, Theo felt the same, because he said urgently, “Come _on_. Let’s move.”

“Draco?” Harry prompted.

It took Draco another moment to reply. “I need to rest.”

“Fuck this,” Theo said.

That was all the warning they got. His hand was there on Harry’s shoulder, and then it abruptly wasn’t, and all they could see was the impression of his body parting the sea of grass as he ran, propelled by gravity, down the hill.

Harry made an instinctive lunge, but missed. He cursed.

Draco said, “Don’t chase after him.”

“No,” Harry agreed, and ground his teeth. “Even if I caught him, we’d probably have to bind him with a spell, and then he’s just a liability. At least this way he’s probably going in the right direction, and might get out on his own.”

“Well, yes.” A pause. “What I meant was: don’t leave me.”

“Of course not,” Harry said instantly, before processing the entire message. He let out a tiny laugh.

“What?” Draco demanded.

“Nothing, just — the thing to say in your situation is, usually, ‘Go on without me, I’ll catch up,’ isn’t it?”

“Why? I’d be lying to my own detriment. Maybe _you_ would say that, but you’re —“

“— an idiot, I know,” Harry finished for him, a bit more seriously than he’d meant to at first. He’d just remembered: Draco, reading that stupid book over and over again, trying to get Archer to save the world and failing. Harry said, “I like your honesty.”

“I’m not honest,” Draco said ardently. “I’d lie all the time if it served my purpose.”

Harry smiled to himself. “Do you think we can move slowly? Or should I levitate you?”

“I’m invisible; you’re going to drop me.”

“I’ll be very careful.”

“I’m okay, anyway. Give me another minute.”

It was longer than a minute. Draco’s steps when they began to descend were steady, but he stopped speaking once more, and Harry could sense that all his effort was being expended on simply walking.

The two of them made a snail’s progress across the field, buffeted by the wind. Theo was now long gone, and Harry, not having any natural tracking skills whatsoever, could not see much sign of his passing. He did, however, see the glimmers and afterglow of spellwork, far off to their left and beyond the boundary. Hermione’s promised distraction, he supposed.

They were beginning on the second hill when Harry felt a prickling at the base of his neck, an animalistic paranoia that someone or something was watching them, invisibility be damned.

There was the bent grass, the scent of their sweat. It was far too possible.

And: there had been no howls in a while. What that a good thing, or a bad thing?

He didn’t have time to think it over. He pushed Draco down and ducked. There was a great _whoosh_ as a body tunnelled through the air. A giant werewolf, having launched itself from a patch of grass diagonal to them and missed at the last second, pivoted awkwardly on the slanting ground to regain its balance below them. It was dark blue and pale gold in the moonlight, except for its teeth, which were starkly white. Beside it, another patch of grass shivered against the wind. Two werewolves. At least.

“_Serpensortia_,” Harry cast, twice in quick succession, and said to the pythons, the largest he could summon, “_Distract them, please._“ He pulled Draco up. “Get behind me, put your arms around my neck. I’ll carry you.”

Draco was heavy, and the path was not as easy to navigate as it appeared. The grass obscured the geography underneath, which was at times muddy, at times solid. Harry, unable to plan his steps well, tripped and nearly fell.

As he got back up, Draco’s weight suddenly became a fraction of what it had been.

He’d cast a some sort of lightening charm on himself. In this wind, he was in danger of being blown off. Harry said, “Hold on tighter,” and began to run.

Below them, the snarling suggested that the wolves were making quick work of the snakes. Harry chanced a glance back, and saw the two of them tearing at the body of one python as though it were a rope and they were playing a game of tug-of-war. There had been no human intelligence in those wolf eyes, which was, in a way, lucky. A human would have disposed of the snakes quickly and refocused on their real target.

They reached the top of the hill and came within sight of the boundary. It was not marked by a fence of any kind, but at that moment it would have been obvious to any wizard. Every single layer of ward magic, original and new, was crackling.

Narcissa was standing there, just on the other side, wand raised, mouth moving in an endless enchantment, eyes narrowed in a coldly burning fury.

“Mother,” Draco gasped in shock. The wind snatched it up, carrying it away, and yet, still, somehow, Narcissa’s gaze snapped in their direction. Draco’s grip loosened.

In the moonlight then, Harry saw quite clearly — as though the instant lasted for an age — the shadows of the wolves, overlaid on top of his own. Only Harry’s, because Draco, under the Cloak, cast no shadow. Harry had time to reconstruct the scene in his mind and wonder at the strange tableau. What must it have looked like from Narcissa’s point of view? Two wolves leaping at a patch of air from which her son’s voice had escaped.

He grabbed one of Draco’s arms and pushed aside the other, then flung him, arm over shoulder, toward the boundary, toward Narcissa. The Cloak, blown open by the wind, revealed Draco, who — as light as he currently was — flew far and fast, and would have been carried further by the wind if Narcissa had not reacted with impressive speed and cast a spell to catch him.

Harry dove out of the throw into a graceless roll toward the side, feeling the impact of a wolf landing directly after. He rose into a crouch and slashed his wand.

He hadn’t cast from a good angle; the spell only cut open the wolf’s muzzle. It screamed, dropping its head into the grass. The sound was not quite human and not quite animal.

The second wolf was wholly unconcerned. It had looked from Harry to Narcissa to Draco, and settled on Harry. It was preparing to leap again.

Three spells hit it at once. Harry’s cut open its chest. Draco’s ripped off its leg. That might not have been enough, because this was a werewolf, bound together by a curse most ancient, but Narcissa had used _Avada Kedavra_. The werewolf was, in a flash of green and a splatter of blood, dead.

Harry scrambled to his feet and sprinted for the boundary, landing on his knees next to Draco. He dispelled his Disillusionment and met Narcissa’s eye.

She looked at him assessingly and, almost off-handedly, killed the remaining werewolf.

“_Finite Incantatem_,” Harry cast at Draco, restoring his weight and removing the spell Narcissa had used to hold him in place.

“Darling,” Narcissa said, and was kneeling down, untying the Cloak from Draco’s throat. “I was not informed of your participation in this mission. We’ll discuss that later.”

“There’s nothing to discuss,” Draco said tiredly. “Mother, I told Pansy not to tell you until we’d already left.”

“A mistake,” Narcissa responded, “because the ones who went with you are not ruthless enough to keep you safe.”

Draco was not often annoyed with his mother, but he was now, Harry could tell. “I’m fine. Don’t coddle, please. Let me up.”

As he stood, Narcissa said tolerantly, “Theodore Nott ran through here earlier, and Nymphadora apparated him back to safety. He said he got separated from the two of you.” She added, “I hadn’t realised that you were such good friends, that you would go to such efforts to rescue him.”

She didn’t know about the Horcruxes, of course, and was fishing for more information. “Theodore Nott is an arsehole,” Harry said conclusively, “and the next time I see him I’m going to punch him in the face.”

Narcissa raised an eyebrow. “I see. In a moment, then. I must cast the signal so that those involved in the diversion can know to retreat.”

She walked a few paces away and raised her wand high. A spark of light rose into the air, and grew brighter as it did so. It flared silver and gold at its peak, and Harry had to look away; it was almost like staring at the sun. Spots of colour bloomed across his vision.

It was a mistake on top of a mistake. He’d let his guard down, and then he had blinded himself temporarily. And Draco had done the same.

Neither of them reacted fast enough when the third wolf attacked Narcissa. They didn’t see it until it was too late. Only Narcissa herself, who had cast the signal with her eyes trained away, reacted at all. It was still too slow: she succeeded just barely in saving herself from the wolf’s bite, but not its claws, which tore a red gash across her throat and bore her down into the dirt.

The very next moment was the one in which Narcissa would have died, except that the wolf stopped and looked at them. It opened its mouth and curled its tongue, and began to make a truncated sound like a hoarse cough — laughter. This wolf, unlike the other two, had taken Wolfsbane.

While Harry was thinking this, Draco raised his wand and cast the Killing Curse.

His aim was not quite steady. The wolf dodged it.

“_Impendimenta_,” Draco cast. “_Esgarasi_. _Agsioaus_. _Crucio_. _Crucio_. _Avada Kedavra_.”

The wolf dodged them all. It was using the placement of Narcissa’s body strategically; Draco could only aim the spells in certain ways, so as to not hit his mother, who was still breathing.

“_Glaciarius Exios_,” Harry said, and cast it wide.

At once, the ice came and crystallised and consumed. It covered the the ground and encased Narcissa’s body, shattered every fragile blade of grass. It forced itself up the wolf’s legs, and might have clung on, but the wolf — panicking — twisted around and used its only true weapon, the weapon of the curse: it bit through the ice, and the ice crumbled.

The wolf turned and ran.

Harry, who had been watching for it, immediately went to Narcissa, unfreezing her, reaching for Draco at the same time. “We’re apparating,” he said, and did so.

They came back into existence at the point just outside Hogsmeade, where Hermione had set a wooden marker.

Draco had his wand pointed at Narcissa’s neck, and seemed to be casting every healing spell he could think of nonverbally. None of them were working. Finally, he put his hands on the open wound and pressed. He said, expression blank, “Potter, I need dittany.”

“Harry?” someone said, and it was Pansy. Her robes were torn. “Harry — oh, fuck. Demetri, get the medic team right now.”

“Harry,” said Draco again, “help me.”

What he really meant was, _save her_. Harry didn’t know how. He knelt down and applied pressure. Underneath the blood, the part of Narcissa’s throat that had not been ripped open was rot green and bruise purple.

“Draco,” Harry said, in control because he had to be, “we have to get her to the hospital wing. Draco —“

“Draco,” Pansy said, coming closer but not touching him. “Draco — Harry, hold him. Draco, the medic team is here. They need to take her. Let go.”

“No,” Draco said. “Mother —“

Harry, jaw clenched, put his arms around Draco and pulled him away, long enough for a stretcher to be conjured, for Narcissa to be lifted away between four fliers on brooms.

“We need brooms as well,” he said to Pansy sharply.

She was already barking commands: “Demetri, call the scouts back. Emma, Aemad, brooms.” She handed the first broom to Draco.

As they rode into Hogwarts, Harry braced himself to see destruction, but things would have looked almost normal, if it weren’t for the fact that there were people moving with purpose everywhere: by air, by foot. Lights were shining from nearly every window.

They bypassed the Astronomy Tower and flew straight toward a seventh floor window. The connecting corridor was eerily quiet, but that changed as soon as they entered the hospital wing. Harry had never seen it so crowded before. Most of the people in the beds were lying completely still with their arms stretched out at a right angle to their body, their skin dry and chalky, as though they had been almost (but not quite) turned to stone. Each one was being tended to by at least one person wearing dragonhide gloves.

Draco spared every bed a glance long enough to ascertain that his mother was not in it, and charged onward to the back of the wing, where the castle had grown yet more doors. As they approached, one of them opened, and the medic team from earlier emerged. Their faces were sombre, and they let Harry and Draco pass without comment.

Narcissa was in a private room. Draco went straight to her side, ignoring the tall woman with cropped, dark red hair who was standing next to her bed.

“Hi,” she said as they entered. “I’m Bluewell. I’m was a healer at St Mungo’s. Still am, to be sure.”

Harry shook her hand to be polite. “Harry Potter. And Draco Malfoy.”

“Yes, of course,” said Bluewell. “I remember this patient; she came into St Mungo’s a while ago to be treated for the Lunar Nightmare Curse.”

“Harry,” said Draco, “she’s still bleeding.”

“This was caused by a werewolf, correct?” inquired Bluewell, and nodded at Harry’s confirmation. “Then it’s standard procedure. I’ve given her the necessary potions through injection, as the unfortunate location of the wound prevents her from drinking. The rest is up to her. If she lasts the next nine hours or so, she’ll stabilise. If not, I’ve been told in confidence that we have access to a werewolf of our own, who can administer the bite —“

“Wait,” Harry interrupted. “What?”

“Lycanthropy is a disease, Mr Potter,” said Bluewell. “The bite transfers it for certain, but any wound inflicted by a werewolf has the potential to carry the pathogens, shall we say, to use a rather Muggle term. This is what prevents the wounds from healing easily, same as any other high level curse. Recovery depends most strongly on the victim’s own magic. If their magic were especially weak, they might submit to the curse even without a direct bite. However, the chances of that happening with Mrs Malfoy are slim to none. Her magic is strong. But that does not mean it will necessarily win: in her particular case, if she cannot fight off the curse in time, she’ll bleed to death. To prevent that most final outcome, our only recourse will be to force her in the other direction; in other words, to ensure that the curse overcomes her. If she surrenders to lycanthropy, the curse itself will help her heal, as faster regeneration is one of the primary and only advantages of being a werewolf.”

“My mother,” said Draco, “is not going to be a werewolf.”

“She may have to, if you want her to live,” Bluewell said mildly. She Summoned a small lacquered wooden box and opened it. Inside was a single needle filled with a dark purple liquid. “If her heartbeat slows and her magic level drops too much, give her this. It will give her a boost. You can inject her upper arm, right here.” She saw Draco’s stare and added, “Both my parents were nurses. Muggle healers, I mean. This thing here? It’s saved lives. Sometimes, people are dying and can’t drink a potion, and no spell will do the job. It’s a right challenge to get most potions thin enough to fit through a needle, but it’s doable. This concoction here was perfected by a team in India.”

Draco took the box.

“Thank you,” Harry said.

“Welcome,” Bluewell replied. “Call me if you require assistance. There’s sixty-seven other patients out there who need looking after, so I’ll take my leave.”

“Wait. Sorry, just — where’s Madam Pomfrey?”

Bluewell’s expression softened. “She’s alive. Merely sleeping. She’d been going without for too long.”

The room felt smaller when Bluewell left. There was one window, a tiny slit by the corner, which seemed to let in no fresh air. Harry sat down next to Draco silently.

After a while, Draco said tonelessly, “You froze everything in a mile radius.”

“I learnt that spell from a book from the Manor’s library,” Harry told him.

“I shouldn’t have told her to join the stupid Order.”

“She was trying to break the wards to get to you. She would have done that even if she wasn’t in the Order. You were in danger.”

“If I — if —“ Draco stopped. “Mother can’t die. She can’t die.”

Harry held the words in his chest for a long while before speaking. “Would it be so bad for her to — to be bitten?”

“Of course it would,” Draco answered instantly. “It would destroy her.”

“But, I mean —“

“Oh,” Draco said. “You mean would I still love her? I would. I would love her through anything. But it would destroy her. It’s not about what I can endure, it’s about what she will allow. And she won’t allow — that.”

Harry said, after a pause, “I don’t think I understand.”

“No, you don’t. You never have, but you don’t need to. Mother won’t allow it. She will not suffer it. She wouldn’t want to live that way. If I let them, if I — she’ll never forgive me.”

“You … you don’t think she’ll love you through anything, the same as you for her?”

Draco took a long time to reply. He said, carefully, “She’ll love me, I think. Except perhaps not as much as before. Realising it would hurt her more than she could bear. I could endure it, but I — Harry, I don’t — I can’t do that to her.”

“You don’t want to do that to her,” Harry said heavily, and felt for a fleeting second that perhaps they were talking about something else.

“No,” Draco said. “I don’t.”

Harry looked at Draco’s hand, which was not holding Narcissa’s but instead monitoring her pulse at her wrist. He took out his wand and cast _Tempus_. “Bluewell said nine hours for stabilisation, but the moon will set before then. So you have about four hours or less to make the decision.”


	31. Chapter 31

Narcissa survived. There was a dangerous moment in the third hour, when her heartbeat rose with a terrible stutter and plummeted again just as suddenly, and they were forced to give her the injection. Draco, face flattened again with that blank lack of expression, opened his mouth as if to speak once or twice, but each time said nothing in the end.

Harry went to the window to watch the sky for him, and made the pronouncement when the night was well and truly over. Only then did Draco’s skin regain some colour; the pink returning to his cheeks seemed to bring with it every emotion he had been repressing, the result being that when Harry turned fully away from the window, Draco was already beginning to cry.

Harry sat back down next to him and kept silent. Draco was crying without sound, the sort of succumbing to tears that wanted no acknowledgement. On the bed, Narcissa had not made any marked progress, but she was still fighting. At that point, with no werewolf on hand, the only thing that could save her was herself.

On the sixth hour, Pansy came to check on them. Draco leaned his head against her waist when she went to stand behind him. On the seventh hour, they all heard Narcissa draw breath, much louder and stronger than she had been previously. On the ninth hour, Bluewell came back.

Bluewell cast some diagnostic spells and announced: “She’ll live.”

Draco let out a long breath, bending over briefly, his elbows on his knees, his face in his hands.

Bluewell was still talking. “The recovery process will be a long one, and she would need to see a healer to make sure there are no anomalies. And the scarring will be severe; it won’t ever fade, I’m sorry to say.”

Sitting back up, Draco nodded.

Once Bluewell had gone, Pansy said to Harry quietly, “Hermione will be up at the Room now, with Weasley.”

Harry turned to Draco. Draco said, “You should go, Potter.”

A little reluctantly, Harry did. He left the hospital wing on the fifth floor to give himself the opportunity to climb back up the stairs two by two. He felt restless and inexplicably inconsolable, unable to prove to himself that he was safe — at least momentarily — even though any and all adrenaline had left his system ages ago, and he was utterly drained. A shaft of sunlight touched his cheek; he flinched.

Hermione, when he met her, did not look particularly well-rested either. She hugged him as soon as he was through the door and said in a rush, “Harry, I was so afraid — but you’re all right. And, and Malfoy too — I heard that his mother, that she — is she all right?”

“I think she will be,” Harry replied.

Ron clapped him on the back, and after a few seconds of manly grinning, hugged him as well. “I knew you’d be fine,” he said. Ron, at least, appeared to have eaten and washed and perhaps slept somewhat in the hours that had passed.

“What happened?” Harry asked. Unhooking the backpack from his shoulder, he added, “I have the cup. We need to destroy it. And Theo — where is Theo?”

“He’s in the Slytherin dormitories.” Hermione showed him the Map. “Tonks is keeping guard over the door. He did say you got the cup; I think he was trying to use it as a bargaining chip.” She gestured at the Room. “We can destroy it here, right now.”

She’d requested a large, empty room. The floor, Harry noticed, resembled concrete. The walls were similarly grey and bare.

He unzipped the backpack and upended it, stepping away cautiously when the cup emerged, bouncing against the frames of the two portraits. Hermione had brought another basilisk fang.

Dying, the cup was like the diadem, screeching with a repulsive echo that made them all nauseous. After all the trouble they had gone to to retrieve it, Harry had almost expected something more. But it was done, just like that, and there was only the locket left.

Harry re-wrapped the fang and put it away. He asked again, “What happened? You said Voldemort came to Hogwarts.”

“He came for Dumbledore’s tomb,” Hermione said. “When Ron and I arrived back, the fight — I don’t know if you can call it a fight — was just starting. I have reports that he went to the false safehouse first, but he didn’t stay there. Somehow, he must have made the connection between Dumbledore and the Elder Wand, but we buried Dumbledore with his first wand, according to his wishes — so obviously there was nothing there for You-Know-Who to plunder.” 

“How did he get past the wards?”

“We think he lured out one of the patrols and forced them to bring him in.” Hermione’s voice dipped. “Seamus Finnigan — I’m not sure if you knew him —“

“I know,” Harry said.

“He’s dead,” Ron said.

Occlumency was good for things like this. Harry put up the walls and, behind them, found steel. “Who else? I saw the people in the hospital wing.”

“Those we should be able to save,” said Hermione, though she didn’t sound sure. “You-Know-Who set the curse as a distraction, so that he could escape. He was discovered as soon as he laid hands on the tomb, you see, and then he was outnumbered by the Order. He delayed for as long as it took for him to break open the tomb and see what was inside.”

“Who else?”

“The Hufflepuff who was with Seamus. Jill Waverton. And Snape —“

Harry said, so shocked it came out flatly, “Snape is dead?”

“He’s not dead —“

“No, he isn’t,” said Dumbledore’s voice. “Not yet.”

All three of them jumped and looked around for the source, which was — of course — the portrait, lying there on the ground. Dumbledore had been painted in bright purple robes with a decorative embroidery of shimmering blue stars. It clashed with his eyes, which were utterly serious and did not twinkle even a little.

Hermione recomposed herself first. “Professor, I’m glad to see you.”

“I’m afraid you mustn’t expect too much from me, Miss Granger,” said Dumbledore gravely.

“Why didn’t you appear before?” Harry demanded accusingly. “When we were trapped.”

“What would you have had me do, Harry? Weave an enchantment to whisk you away?” The half-moon glasses flashed. “No. I have but one last duty to perform. The only duty which I can still perform.”

Harry frowned. “What does that mean?”

“If I’m not mistaken,” Dumbledore said, not answering the question, “you have just destroyed the cup. How many Horcruxes are left?”

“Just the one,” Harry told him. “As you well know. Slytherin’s locket.”

“When one is a portrait, one must be particularly careful with what one does or does not know. Have you a means to locate the locket?”

Harry was tempted to also not answer and give Dumbledore a taste of his own medicine. It wouldn’t have accomplished anything, though, so he replied, “Theo knows, or can find out for us. We hope. He’s buried it in a forest somewhere.”

“Then it’s time. Harry, you must go and see Professor Snape right now.”

Harry exchanged a look with Hermione and Ron. “Why?”

“There is something he must tell you.”

“Why can’t you tell me?”

“I could,” acknowledged Dumbledore. “However, I think you would prefer to hear this from someone still living.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me before you died?”

“It wasn’t the right time.”

Of course not. Harry closed his eyes and sighed deeply.

“We’ll go with you,” said Ron consolingly.

“He must go alone,” contradicted Dumbledore.

“Fine,” Harry responded with resignation. He turned to Hermione. “Will you be okay? I know we have more to discuss. Voldemort will be at his most dangerous now, now that he knows he was tricked and has lost both Nagini and the cup. We have to move as quickly as possible.”

“I’ll speak to Theo about the portrait. Leave it with me.” Lightly, Hermione cast a spell to clean his glasses. Harry blinked; he hadn’t really noticed how dirty the lenses had become. “After you’ve spoken with Snape, get some rest.”

“You should, too,” Harry replied, and smiled at her tiredly.

Ron cleared his throat. “Both of you should.”

“One thing at a time.”

***

He had half expected to find Snape in another private room connected to the hospital wing, but Hermione had given him the Map, and the Map showed Snape’s name inked where it most often was: the dungeons.

He didn’t bother knocking. Dumbledore had another portrait here; Snape would be expecting him. And if not, let Snape be surprised for once in his life.

Naturally, Harry was the one taken aback.

Snape was not dead, but he was dying.

That much was obvious instantly. Behind his desk, Snape looked like he had been hit with the full version of the curse that plagued Bluewell’s patients. He had been turned to stone, or something resembling it: his skin and hair and eyes were all unsettlingly pebbled white and grey. As Harry watched, Snape brought a glass to his mouth and drank, very, very slowly. His fingers left white impressions on the glass, and as he swallowed a crack on his jaw deepened. A piece flaked off.

His face was the most mobile part of him. The drawl was thicker than ever.

“Potter. Finally. That was the rest of the poison.”

Harry searched for and found Dumbledore, shoved amongst mortars and cauldrons on a table by the wall. “Why are you drinking poison?”

Snape sneered. “Perhaps on this day, one of my last days, you could gather your admittedly limited mental resources and make an educated guess. If you have indeed learnt anything at this school.”

“I don’t know what that curse is called,” Harry said coldly, still standing by the door. “But I note that you’re moving, unlike the others. And I can see aconite on the table, both fluid and ground. The jar is smashed and covered in the same powdery stuff that’s coming off you. So my guess is that the poison is one you brewed yourself while you still retained some movement, to help you counteract the curse and keep moving. Why was that so difficult for you to answer? What have I ever done to you, specifically, that you must be so hateful, so vile?”

“Your father —“

“I may look like my father,” Harry snapped, “but I’m not him. Gather _your_ limited mental resources and learn the difference.”

“You exist,” Snape intoned. “That’s enough.”

For a moment Harry was so disgusted he considered leaving, Dumbledore’s riddles be damned. He almost did it; he turned around.

“Look at me,” Snape snarled. “Sit down, Potter.”

The seat in front of Snape had a smear of white powder on it. Remembering the dragonhide gloves from the hospital wing, Harry conjured his own chair, barely three paces from the door, and sat.

“I don’t know why Dumbledore thought that hearing anything from you would be any better than hearing it from him,” he remarked with contempt, “but fine: here I am. What is it that I need to know?” Were there more lines to the prophecy that Dumbledore had somehow kept from him? Whatever it was, he just wanted this conversation over with.

“Albus,” said Snape, with the same degree of vitriol, “was scared of how you would react. He was scared of not being able to control you, lest you learn this truth before the time he judged best. And so, even now, his portrait hands the task to me.”

Dumbledore’s portrait remained silent.

“Get on with it,” Harry said.

“You’re Lily Evans’ son,” Snape said, and for a split second his eye flashed its original colour: a beetle’s black. “I have worked for the past six years to keep you from harm.”

And then he told Harry the final secret.

***

Later, Harry found Hermione and Ron and Pansy and talked to them about Theo, about what they should do. Theo, Hermione said, had been shown his own Obliviated memories in the Pensieve, but had not yet agreed to speak to his mother’s portrait. He was attempting to bargain for immunity against all criminal charges for both himself and his father. Hermione was amenable to granting the former but not the latter. They argued back and forth. Aristides Nott had commited atrocities, but they were short on time. They needed the information _now_, and had no leeway for lengthy negotiations. Harry suggested using the Imperius Curse, which caused all three of them to stop and stare at him.

“We force him to call Estelle and speak to her,” Harry elaborated. “Whatever she reveals might be piecemeal, but we can put it together.”

“It might work,” Pansy said consideringly.

“And it might not,” Hermione said, frowning. “The portrait might not be fooled, and that would leave us worse off. Also, it’s unethical.”

“It is,” Harry agreed.

Hermione tried to touch his face. He shied away. She said accusingly, “You haven’t slept. Harry, is something wrong? What did Snape talk to you about?”

He ignored the questions. “Sleeping wouldn’t make me change my mind on this.”

“To be clear, I don’t like the idea,” Pansy said. “Theo’s one of mine. But we do have to consider every option.”

“If Nott doesn’t help us,” Ron pointed out, “he’s as doomed as the rest of us. He knows it. I reckon he’s stalling to try and force us to concede.”

“I won’t,” Hermione said with a flinty resolve. “Not on his father.”

“Then how will you get him to do what we want?” Harry asked. “Please don’t say by appealing to his morals.”

Hermione crossed her arms. “I’ll figure something out.”

“You’d better,” Pansy said grimly. “And you’d better do it fast.”

***

Still later, Harry returned to Draco, who had not left Narcissa’s side. The wound on her neck was mending, but still looked hideously raw.

“Two more healers came,” Draco informed him. “They said she might lose her ability to speak.”

Draco was gaunt, his eyes red-rimmed and almost bruised. Harry searched for something to say. “But she’ll live.”

“She will.”

That was good. It was good. He told himself that it was. He knew it was. Everything felt very difficult to process. He kept being distracted by weird inconsequential things, like the feeling of his lungs taking in air, or the sensation of saliva in his mouth, or the way blood moved to his hand if he flexed his fingers.

“Harry?” Draco said.

Harry shook himself. He said, “Snape won’t live.”

“What?”

“Snape. He’s dying.”

Alive, living. Dead, dying. He watched Draco take in this new information.

Draco said, “I should go see him,” and didn’t get up.

“I don’t know if he’s still at a stage where he can interact with anything,” Harry said, and when Draco only looked confused, amended it with, “I’ll watch Narcissa.”

Draco went.

***

Even later, he slept. He was walking down a dungeon corridor, not quite sure how he’d got there, and then he was in the Slytherin common room, and then he was standing next to his old bed, staring at his miniature figurine of the Hungarian Horntail, still there on the bedside table where he had forgotten it.

And then he was dreaming, a rather mundane dream where Uncle Vernon was driving him to the pound, driving and driving and driving, and Harry couldn’t get out of the car.

He woke up in the middle of the night. Moonlight twisted by the lakewater danced with itself, emerald on the opposite wall. He got up, showered, and went to the kitchen to find food to eat.

A boy dressed in Muggle trousers and a shrunken robe was there, cutting up a giant blueberry pie.

“Hello,” he said politely.

“Hi,” Harry responded.

“I’m Jonah.”

Harry squinted at him and made the connection. “Ah. I’m Harry.”

“Harry, like Harry Potter?”

Dully: “How’d you guess.”

“Everyone’s always talking about a Harry Potter.” Jonah sounded disapproving. “I thought you’d look cooler.”

Harry appropriated a piece of the pie. “Oh yeah?”

“You’re supposed to have a lightning bolt scar.”

Harry pushed up his fringe.

Jonah wrinkled his nose. “Is that it? It’s bleeding. I can’t tell what it looks like. Are scars supposed to bleed like that?”

Wiping at his forehead with the sleeve of his robe, Harry said, “This one’s a magical scar.”

“Because it bleeds?”

“Well, no.”

“Then why?”

“It’s cursed,” Harry said unhelpfully.

“Scars aren’t that cool anyway,” Jonah supplied, apparently now bored of this line of inquiry. “Tattoos are cooler.”

The blueberry pie was sweet and a little bit sour. It was perfect.

“I heard your parents are dead,” Jonah said, like it was a challenge.

Harry reached for another slice. “Yeah, they are.”

“Mine are, too.”

“I know.”

Jonah held his hands out in front of him. “Everyone says I saved my sister. I wish I’d saved my parents too.”

Harry supposed that he was obligated to say something comforting. Except he was all out of comfort. He said instead, “The Time Turners were all destroyed, and anyway you wouldn’t have been allowed.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you wouldn’t be allowed to go back and save them, even if there was a way.”

Hotly, Jonah demanded, “Why not?”

“It probably wouldn’t work out well.” Harry considered. “For instance, you go back and save your parents, and your sister dies instead.”

“I wouldn’t! I wouldn’t let her die. I’d save them all.”

“You save them all, but five hundred other people die in their place.”

“No, I’d do it _properly_. Why are you saying such horrible things?”

Jonah’s hair was a little longer than the last time Harry had seen it, but it still stuck up in little unruly spikes. Harry looked at him and tried, through all the fog, to recall compassion. “You’d save them all?”

“I’d save them all.” Jonah raised his head defiantly.

“What would you give, to save them all?”

“What do you mean?”

“How far are you willing to go?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Jonah said angrily. “I would go really far. As far as I can walk. And all my toys are gone, but I don’t need any of them if I could have my mum and dad.”

Harry stole yet another slice of pie. “You’re brave.”

Jonah was brave, but there was no changing the past. If you were going to go as far as you could, give everything you owned to save someone, save everyone, you had to do it right the first time.

***

The next few days went by hazily. He slept when he slept, and woke when he woke, heedless of day or night. Mostly he kept Draco’s wordless company, as Draco tended to Narcissa. Narcissa had woken a few times, but only briefly, never quite fully conscious. The healers said that it was better this way, that her body and magic could direct all available resources towards healing. In fact, Bluewell, after casting diagnostic spells on Draco, declared that his own condition would benefit from the same thing, and was disappointed when he refused.

In a way it was fortunate, because there was no doubt that if Draco had been any less preoccupied, Harry would have been found out.

Hermione was more difficult. With her, he had to lie and deflect.

“It was just some stuff about —“ he made a vague gesture — “about the protection spell my mum put on me.” At the unconvinced look on her face, he added wildly, “Dumbledore wanted to warn me that I couldn’t rely on it, since Voldemort used my blood to ressurect himself.”

“But didn’t you already know that?” Hermione said, plainly perplexed. “No, hang on — this is an interesting point. Dumbledore had you stay with the Dursleys because of the bond of blood, right? But if You-Know-Who took your blood in fourth year … then …”

Harry stopped and blinked. “That’s … I hadn’t made that connection. Oh no, wait — Dumbledore was the one who cast that charm. There were two spells. I forgot.”

Hermione’s gaze focused on him sharply. “What do you mean, you forgot? Isn’t that what you talked about, with Snape?”

He put up his hands in surrender. “Look, it wasn’t the most illuminating conversation. Don’t ask me.”

“Snape didn’t explain any further?”

Snape had now been completely quarantined in a windowless cell deep in the bowels of Hogwarts to wait for death. It made Harry strangely ill to think about. Part of it was disgust directed at himself. Who cared if Snape died? Harry certainly didn’t. He was glad. Except Snape was the last person alive who knew what Harry had to do. “You think Snape of all people would bother?”

Thankfully, Hermione seemed to accept this as a fair point, even if she didn’t appear completely mollified. She said, half to herself, “Perhaps there are books on bonds of blood in the library. I could go look it up.”

Seizing his chance to change the topic, Harry asked, “What about Theo? Any progress?”

“I think so,” she replied, to his astonishment. “I’ll let you know soon. I still have to check over the specifics.”

“The specifics?” he echoed. “What exactly are you planning on doing?”

“You’ll see.”

Everywhere in the castle people seemed to have accepted that some sort of final confrontation was near, without even knowing precisely why. Harry stopped trying to hide his presence and moved about openly, if not conspicuously. Voldemort’s full attention was now turned on the location of the locket, and the locket was not in Hogwarts.

In fact, as it so happened, the locket was not even in the United Kingdom.

“It’s in Sweden?!” Ron said incredulously. “Why is it in bloody Sweden?”

“I might be wrong,” Theo said. “I just think it’s highly likely that I would have gone to Sweden.” He sat back in his chair and raised his eyebrows in a way that did not inspire Harry’s utmost confidence.

Harry said to Hermione, “Are you sure he’s telling the truth?”

“He made an Unbreakable Vow with me,” Hermione said. “He’s sworn to help us locate the locket to the best of his abilities. So yes, I’m sure. But as he hasn’t spoken to the portrait yet, like he said, he could be wrong.”

“You made an Unbreakable Vow,” said Harry in disbelief.

“She did,” Pansy confirmed. “I was the bonder.”

“What did you promise him?”

“That, should his father survive the war, I will not allow him to be sentenced to an Azkaban guarded by Dementors,” Hermione said coolly. “I fully intend that he be judged for his crimes before the Wizengamot, of course, but I have always been against the use of Dementors on prisoners. It’s inhumane and unnecessary. That will be the first policy I work to abolish. I doubt it would even be that hard, given how all of them left to join You-Know-Who’s army, thereby demonstrating their unreliability.”

There was a short pause. “Okay,” Harry said.

“Theodore agreed that this is a fair compromise,” Hermione added. “Eventually.”

“I also asked you out,” Theo commented nonchalantly. “You said you’d think about it.”

“He what,” said Ron murderously.

“I thought about it,” Hermione said at the same time. “And I decided no. You’re not my type at all.” With her wand, she tapped Estelle’s portrait, still that empty desert, and sent it levitating a hand’s breadth above the table. “Enough of that. Let’s begin.”

“Hang on,” said Theo curiously. “Where’s Draco? Isn’t he part of your little gang?”

“He’s in the hospital wing,” Harry told him shortly. “Stop delaying.”

“I’m not delaying,” Theo argued, but drew his wand and set it on the canvas. He cast no spell but said only, “Mother, it’s me.”

Estelle Nott came into the frame like she had wandered there by accident. She was wearing robes of a foreign cut and a veil over her head. When she took the veil off a shower of buttercups fell from her hair. Her feet were bare in the sand.

“Dearest,” she said, smiling. “I was just talking to you. In my dream.”

“Yes, Mother,” Theo said patiently.

“We were in Atlantis, sweetling,” she went on, staring past him into the far distance. “The waterfalls, oh, and the rim of the ocean, falling into oblivion. Shall we go back? We must.”

“We will,” Theo said. “Tell me about what we saw.”

“The Atlantic mages had the water of life, dearest. A lake, such a lake, clear and still. I led my steed down to its shores and let him drink, and when I turned I had two steeds, the second a perfect mirror of the first. And, oh, the city, with its spire —“

“Is this relevant?” interrupted Ron.

“Shush,” Hermione admonished.

“— and the streets leading down to the sea floor. I took you to see the serpents, did I not?”

“You did,” Theo assured her. “Mother, do you remember, before Atlantis, I think, you went somewhere with Father? You told me about it — a canopy in the stars —“

“Yes, yes,” Estelle said enthusiastically. “We built a cabin together in the air, and stayed there for a month. We swung you from the balcony into the aurora …”

“Yes, I remember. And what did we count to? Above that forest, as I swung?”

“Oh, sweetling, count? What did we count?”

“Perhaps the number of shooting stars, Mother. Do you remember? You always remember for me.”

“One and two,” Estelle said, sounding less certain now. “We counted — was it me? Or was it you?”

“Together, Mother. Only I don’t remember.”

“Thirty-seven.” Estelle held out her fingers, waggling them. “Thirty-seven, I think you said. And one-hundred-and-two, and eighty-five.”

“Thirty-seven, one-hundred-and-two, eighty-five,” Theo repeated.

“That’s right,” Estelle said.

“Thank you, Mother. I love you so.”

“And I love you always, dearest,” she replied.

“Will you wait a moment, now? I have guests to entertain.”

“Keep them warm, and keep them dry,” she answered. “It’s raining.”

Very gently, Theo turned the portrait so that it was face down on the table.

“You know where it is?” Hermione prompted.

“I can work it out.” Summoning parchment and ink, Theo began to write. “A long time ago, Father commissioned a property in Sweden. A small isolated place in the middle of nowhere, where he liked to paint. He took me there when I was a child, and to keep myself occupied I came up with a way to map the surrounding forest. A sort of code. Not terribly complex, but no one else knows it.” He slid the parchment over to Hermione.

Hermione inspected a series of arithmancy equations that looked like gibberish and said, “I see.”

“Glad one of us does,” muttered Ron. “What was all that stuff about Atlantis?”

“It’s one of her favourites,” Theo said, which made Ron look even more bewildered.

“All right,” Pansy said. “We have what we need then? That was easier than I was anticipating.”

“You still have to go to Sweden and follow the numbers,” Theo said.

“You mean _we_ still have to go,” Hermione corrected absently, scrawling her own notes next to Theo’s.

“I mean —“ Theo looked around the table at all of them. “I’m not much of a team player. I was rather hoping that you’d prefer for me to stay here.”

“You made a Vow,” Hermione said. “You have to go.”

“Oh, don’t look so glum,” Pansy scolded.

“Are _you_ going?” Theo asked.

“No, don’t be silly,” she replied, in the unbothered tones of someone who had not made any vows, unbreakable or otherwise. “I don’t do field work.”

Theo groaned. “I really don’t want to.”

“Too bad,” Harry said unsympathetically. It wasn’t like he wanted to, either.


	32. Chapter 32

Narcissa still had not woken properly, so when Harry told Draco about Sweden and their preparations for departure, it was in anticipation of Draco saying that he needed to stay with her.

What Draco actually said was, “Sweden? So we’ll be taking Portkeys?”

Harry stared. “You’re coming with us?”

“Don’t make bad jokes, Potter,” Draco said sternly. “When are we leaving?”

“What about your mother?”

“She’s healing. Pomfrey says her condition is improving at a commendable rate. Exact words.” Draco saw the expression on Harry’s face and made an exasperated sound. “Potter, really.”

“It’s just — you haven’t left her side at all, so I thought —“

“Of course I wouldn’t leave her side,” Draco interjected. “She got attacked by a werewolf!”

“Then why —“

“You weren’t about to gallivant off to Sweden at any point previous to this.” Draco touched his fingers to his temple. “Why are we even — I can’t believe we’re arguing about this. Merlin and Morgana, why would I let you go alone?”

“I’m not going alone.”

Draco ignored this. “Are you quite all right? Professor Snape … He died last night, I heard. You spoke with him, didn’t you? Was it something he said?”

Harry opened his mouth. Stopped.

“It was something he said, wasn’t it,” Draco concluded. Then, more astutely, eyes narrowing, “What did he say?”

“Insults,” Harry deflected. “The usual.”

But Draco had caught on to something now. “The last time we spoke to him together, he said — no, rather, there was an implication, wasn’t there, that Dumbledore was still hiding something. And Dobby gave you Dumbledore’s portrait.”

“Draco,” Harry said.

“What did Professor Snape say to you?”

“You’re, you’re overthinking —“

“Don’t lie to me, Potter.”

Harry dug his fingernails into his palm. “I don’t — I can’t.”

“Can’t what?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“You can. What did he say to you?”

“Please stop asking.”

“Harry —“

“I really can’t.”

“Is it about the prophecy?”

“Draco. Stop asking.”

Draco tugged on his arm. Harry turned to meet his eyes.

“You really can’t?” Draco asked. And, while attempting a smirk: “Not even a hint?”

“No.”

“You mean that you don’t want to.”

“Both at once.”

Draco searched his face. “You won’t even tell me why?”

“No.”

“Okay,” Draco said, soft and subdued, and even that hurt. It hurt them both. “Okay. But I’m coming with you to Sweden.”

***

One of the unforeseen downsides of wizarding fast travel was that it did not feel like travelling at all, most of the time. Certainly, each method was full of sensations — most of them unpleasant — but once you got over the nausea it was really quite similar to stepping into another room. There was a reason why it was traditional for Hogwarts students to take the Hogwarts Express every year, and it wasn’t because that made it more convenient for Muggleborn families. Harry had never seriously complained about apparition or Portkeys or Flooing before, but he’d always thought that it made the world seem awfully small sometimes, especially when you left one forest (some inconspicuous woods near Dufftown) to appear in another one (somewhere in northern Sweden) in the same amount of time it took a Muggle elevator to travel from one floor to the next.

At least they were required to walk once they landed, since Aristides Nott had covered his holiday getaway — which really was in the middle of nowhere — with the standard wards and repellants. They’d brought brooms to fly on, but Theo had insisted that he needed to be at ground level to navigate, and both he and Hermione were far too slow on their brooms amidst the tree trunks, so they all proceeded on foot.

“Did your father really have to ward off half the mountain?” Ron queried after about an hour of hiking.

“Seems standard to me,” Draco remarked.

“Shocking,” said Ron sarcastically.

“_I’d_ be shocked if your own family didn’t ward at least some of the land surrounding your house,” Draco retorted. Half-heartedly, he added, “Unless you really live in a hovel.”

“It’s a couple of wheat fields,” Ron replied. “Not a mountain.”

“It’s not as much of it as you think, actually,” Theo said. “This area is all natural forest, which is easier to stretch, and Swedish wizarding law for space dilation is especially lenient when it comes to unpopulated locales.”

“I’ve read a little about that,” Hermione volunteered. “I got the impression that it’s not really regulated.”

“Well,” Theo said, and the two of them proceeded to have an extensive discussion about things like due process and permits and something called the Magical Euro-Asia Agreement for True Space Conservation that was so boring and long-winded Ron actually pleaded for them to stop.

Harry wasn’t nearly as desperate as Ron, but he was very glad all the same when the house came into view — though it looked rather more like a small cabin than a proper house. It was surrounded by wildflowers and wrapped along its right side by a cheerful stream.

Theo told them, a little unnecessarily by this point, “It’s much larger on the inside.”

“Yeah, okay, you can stop showing off,” Ron said. “As long as there’s a place for us to stay while we look for the locket, I don’t care.”

“Oh, we’re not going inside,” Theo said. “It’s my father’s private studio. Without his permission, I wouldn’t let anyone in.”

“Okay. Then … we go straight to the locket? It’s close?”

“Did you pay attention during the briefing I gave?” Hermione said. “No, don’t bother answering, it’s obvious you didn’t —“

“You were going on and on about arithmancy and longitude and latitude and Wayva’s formula or whatever —“

“The Weyvack Principle, Ron —“

“— and took bloody centuries to get the point —“

“— it’s crucial that you understand, that we all understand the method —“

“Morgana’s mercy, will you people shut up,” Draco said loudly. Ron and Hermione stopped talking over each other and whipped around as one to glare at him. “Weasley, Nott needs to use the house as a starting point to locate where he buried the locket. Based on the numbers, it’s not close, and we might have to move slowly and double-check everything, because if we make even one mistake, we’ll probably have to start over. As this is partially dilated space, some of the forest repeats itself, which makes it easier to get lost. It’ll probably take a few days at least. We have tents.”

“Oh,” said Ron, stunned. “Er. Thanks.”

Draco ruined it by saying to Hermione, “Try short and simple sentences next time, Granger,” causing Ron to renew his glare.

The tents were not luxurious ones, which generated more tension. Draco bemoaned the cheap furnishings, the low ceiling, the single-stove kitchen, and the narrow bunk beds, and made very explicit his position, which was that he would not sleep in the same tent as Ron.

There were only two tents, with two bunk beds each. In the interest of keeping peace, Harry said, “I’ll share with Hermione and Ron. Theo, Draco, you guys can take the other.”

“No,” Draco disagreed. “I want to share with you.”

“Fine, then I’ll go in your tent.”

“And Nott can go in Granger’s,” Draco added.

“How about no,” Ron objected. “I don’t want Nott.”

“Since Hermione’s a girl,” Theo pointed out, “shouldn’t she get a tent to herself?”

Draco raised an eyebrow. “Chivalry, Nott?”

“I could’ve thought of that,” Ron said irritably. “Fine, then. But don’t blame me if one of you gets hexed.”

“I’d like to see you try, Weasley.”

“Good grief,” said Hermione, dumping her bag onto the rough wooden floor. “I brought a second tent mostly as a spare. We had enough room here next to the stream to pitch both, but the surrounding forest is dense, and moving on I plan only to clear space that we absolutely need, so we can cover our trail easier. Which means there will be only one tent, where I will transfigure an extra bed.”

“What about tonight, though?” asked Ron petulantly.

“Tonight,” Hermione said, “I’m going to share with Harry. And if the three of you dare hex each other during the night, I’ll double your pain in the morning.”

Harry didn’t particularly want to be alone with Hermione, wary as he was of her deductive reasoning and unrelenting curiosity. He was well aware that his lie to her about what Snape had told him was flimsy. He didn’t want to be quizzed any further.

But this was not a reason he could articulate without consequences, and anyway he also didn’t fancy the idea of spending all night being a mediator between Ron, Theo and Draco.

As it turned out, Hermione didn’t quiz him. Instead, she sat together with him on an old threadbare couch with a cup of hot chocolate and a book, and said not a word the entire evening. At one point, she leaned her head down on his shoulder, and the warm, steady, artless weight of her against his side almost tempted from him a confession about what he now knew.

He said nothing.

The next day produced unhexed versions of Ron, Theo and Draco. It also produced heavy fog, which hampered their initial progress a great deal. By lunchtime they’d hardly moved far enough for the cabin to be out of sight, and by the end of the day — or dusk, rather; Theo needed full daylight to work, and _Lumos Maxima_ was too dangerously revealing to use — Harry wagered that he could have trekked back to their starting point within an hour or less.

“I wish you’d just made a map instead,” Ron said.

“This area is Unplottable,” Theo said. “Hence my devising this system.”

“I wish you’d devised a faster system,” Ron revised.

“I have some theories for optimisation that —“

“Oh no. Can you please not elaborate —“

Theo could not be dissuaded. Soon enough, he and Hermione were having another technical discussion about arithmancy.

“I can’t listen to this all night,” Ron said, as they got ready to sleep.

“Lucky you’re a wizard, then,” Draco said snidely, and to demonstrate his point cast a charm to block all sound from entering or leaving the vicinity of his bunk bed.

It was a neat spell, and done well. Harry, sharing the same bunk, appreciated the quiet.

It had another use later that night, when Harry had a nightmare and Draco was the only one to hear.

Through Lily’s screams, Harry heard Draco’s voice say shakily, “Harry — Harry, hey,” and then, stronger, “Ow, fuck. Stupid ceiling.”

An elbow banged against Harry’s ribs. Harry woke up.

Draco noticed immediately. “Are you okay? This bed is narrower than what we had at your aunt’s place. Did I hit you? Sorry. Can I lie down?”

He was braced awkwardly on his forearms; there wasn’t enough room for him to sit up. The ceiling was that close. Harry, in response, turned on his side so that his back was to the wall. Draco mirrored him, and in this way they sort of fit. It wasn’t very comfortable.

It took Harry’s mind off the nightmare. His knuckles were resting against Draco’s chest.

Draco whispered, “Remember when — well. When you did the same for me?”

Harry did. “My neck hurt so much the next day.”

“Psh.”

“You can go back down. I’m fine.”

“Are you?” One of Draco’s hands was not in a neutral zone. It was on Harry’s hip. His thumb was rubbing at the skin underneath Harry’s shirt, just above the waistband of his boxers. It was only a tiny bit erotic. Mostly, it was just soothing.

Harry might have been lead back into sleep that way, but after a few minutes Draco started talking again. “Harry,” he said.

“Mm?”

“Have you ever learnt any musical instruments?”

“Nup.”

“Thought not. And you can’t dance.”

“Let me guess, you can actually play all the musical instruments.”

“Actually, no. Mother tried at one point to get me interested in the violin. I wasn’t.”

Harry smiled at the mental image.

“I was thinking I could learn,” Draco went on.

“The violin?”

“The harp, maybe.”

“The harp?” Harry repeated dubiously.

“Which would you prefer?”

“Er, I don’t think my preference matters.”

“I’d play for you, so it sort of does.”

“Oh.”

“I mean,” Draco said hurriedly, “I’d eventually put on performances, I’d expect, and you’d be a member of the audience. Something like that. So I wouldn’t play for _you_, specifically. Not every time.”

“I thought you were going to be an alchemist.”

“A person can be a lot of things, Potter. There are a lot of magical applications for music.”

“Mmhm.”

“While we fix the Manor,” Draco continued, “we can live at Ursa-at-Sea. Or Grimmauld Place. Both, maybe.”

“You’d have to complete your NEWTs first,” Harry reminded him.

“This is after our NEWTs, obviously.”

“And after you fix the Manor,” Harry said, “where will you live?”

“Where do you want to live?”

“Well, I couldn’t live with you at the Manor.”

“Why not? You’ve stayed there before.”

Harry closed his eyes briefly, dreaming. “Okay, then.”

Draco’s thumb paused, then resumed. “Okay,” he echoed. “We’ll do that.”

“I do like Ursa, though,” Harry murmured. “And Kreacher can’t be left alone. Someone has to look after him.”

“We will,” Draco replied. “And — there’s so much to do, Harry. We should go travelling. All over the world.”

“Mm.”

“You don’t want to?”

“I want to, very much,” Harry said.

“We could go long-distance flying. It’s not really the done thing these days, with so many Muggles about, but it used to be a fairly popular sport. They say Rowena Ravenclaw flew north to south around the globe nonstop and it made her wiser.”

“Are you seeking wisdom?” Harry teased.

“We’d do it for fun,” Draco declared.

“You know,” Harry ventured, “you could play Quidditch.”

“After Hogwarts? Professionally?” Draco scoffed. “I don’t think so.”

He could play it at Hogwarts too, if he wanted. Once it was over. “I meant you could set up teams and play recreationally. People do that, don’t they?” And Draco genuinely, genuinely loved to fly. He was good at it. Harry didn’t want to think of him flying alone.

“I s’pose.” Draco sounded doubtful.

“It wouldn’t even have to be full teams. Just people we know.”

“So we’d be opposing captains? We’d have to be. I only play Seeker.”

“I know,” Harry said, smiling.

“_You_ might end up being a professional Quidditch player, and then you won’t have time for recreational games.”

“I don’t think I’ll be a professional Quidditch player.”

“No?”

Harry tried to shrug in the cramped space. It didn’t really work, but Draco took his meaning anyway.

Draco said, “We’ll take care of our affairs first, and then … there’s no rush.”

Yourself, or your companion, or the rest of the world, Harry thought. There was really no question. Dumbledore needn’t have been afraid. They were so young, and Draco was right, there was no rush. After the war, all of them would have so much time to find out who they were and what they wanted to do. Harry would make sure of it.

***

They made better progress on the third and fourth days. Not so much because of the weather, which was still consistently foggy, but because Hermione had really gotten the hang of Theo’s magical formulae, whatever they were, and the double and triple-checking was thus sped up considerably by her input.

“It would go even faster if it wasn’t just us,” Hermione said, when Harry expressed his appreciation for her efforts.

“I did try,” he said, apologetic. “But I don’t understand it at all.”

Hermione scribbled something on the working parchment she had been using all day. “Arithmancy should honestly be a compulsory subject for the first two years. It’s appalling how utterly useless you and Ron are.”

“Oi,” Ron said. “I resent that. For one thing, Malfoy is just as useless.”

It was true that Draco, being well-versed in arithmancy, could have (in a best case scenario) been working as hard as Theo and Hermione. Instead, he’d elected to glance over their shoulders once in a while to make comments that Harry wasn’t sure were helpful.

Draco opened his mouth. Harry cut him off. “Let’s not.”

Draco said, filling a pointed pause, “It’s true this expedition could have benefited from fewer superfluous elements.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ron challenged.

“Oh my god,” Harry said in exasperation.

“Nott is here for obvious reasons,” Draco said, ticking off his fingers. “Granger, similarly useful. Potter is here because — well, prophecy, Chosen One, et cetera. And I’m here because Potter’s here. You, Weasley, on the other hand, are tagging along because — what, you don’t have anything better to do?”

Ron spluttered. “You — you’re — how is being here because Harry’s here even — I’m his friend as well, Malfoy!”

“Oh my god,” Harry said again. “Can we not — Ron, just ignore him. He’s being tetchy for some reason —“

“For some reason,” Ron repeated angrily. “Er, no, Harry. He’s always like that. Whinging about the tents like he’s too good to rough it a little — and it’s not even roughing it! — constantly just, just saying any stupid shit that floats into his mind because he can. He’s a prat!”

“True,” Harry agreed, because it was.

“Oh shut up, Potter,” said Draco pleasantly.

“See!” Ron said.

“He’s baiting you,” Harry said to Ron. “With the tent related whinging, and this. Though I’d like to remind you that you started this round.”

“I’m right here,” Draco said. “I’m not baiting anyone, only stating what is true: the tents are shockingly bad, and Weasley is generally useless.”

Ron’s ears were red. Harry put a restraining hand on his arm.

“Hello?” called Hermione. She’d outpaced them by a considerable distance. “Can you boys try and keep up, please? Theodore thinks there’s flatter ground over there we can camp on for the night.”

Ron made a mocking motion with his mouth that looked distinctly like ‘_Theodore thinks_,’ and rushed ahead, pushing Draco out of the way as he went.

***

There was a waterfall nearby. If they hadn’t had magic, they might have gone to find it out of necessity. As it was, a first year spell provided them with all the hydration they needed.

Still, sometime between choosing their camping spot and unpacking the tent, Draco disappeared toward the sound of water.

“Off to manicure his nails in private, is he,” muttered Ron.

“Should he be going off on his own like that?” asked Hermione. “He might get lost.”

“I’ll go get him in a bit,” Harry told her.

“He’s a bloody wanker,” Ron went on, apparently to himself. “Why am I here, he says. Why is _he_ here?”

Theo said something under his breath and laughed.

“What?” said Ron challengingly.

“Nothing,” said Theo innocently.

“On second thought,” said Harry, “I’ll go now.”

They’d climbed a fair bit to reach flatter ground for the campsite; the waterfall turned out to be below. The rivulet that fed it was not immediately visible, being narrow and covered abundantly with overgrown ferns. In the forest-filtered dusk Harry missed seeing it altogether until he was almost directly on top of it, half-slipping on mossy rocks. He saved himself with a spell, then, wand in teeth, climbed hand and foot down and around to where the waterfall cascaded melodiously into a shallow pool.

Draco was there, next to the pool. He was sitting on the only boulder that could be classified as dry. Harry got an arm over and hoisted himself up. It wasn’t a very wide boulder; he had to brace his right leg awkwardly to not fall.

“So Ron’s like that because he’s jealous of Theo, presumably,” he remarked conversationally. “What’s your excuse for being more annoying than usual?”

Draco threw a pebble into the pool. _Plop_.

“You know, I thought you were learning to get along with Ron,” Harry continued.

_Plop_. “What gave you that idea?”

“You hadn’t been provoking him. Since before this trip, I mean.”

“He’s the one provoking me. On this trip.”

“The tents?” Harry reminded him.

“They’re fucking awful tents, Potter.”

“It’s the last — I mean, we’re almost there. Is the state of the tents that important?”

_Plop_.

“I hate this,” Draco said. “This stupid trip with stupid tents and being stuck with Granger and Weasley and Nott. I don’t want to be here at all.”

“You’re the one who said you wanted to come to Sweden —“

“I changed my mind. I’d much rather go someplace warm.” He threw the next pebble extra violently; it bypassed the water completely and hit a bush. “Don’t you? Somewhere with sunshine. Palm trees. The whole lot.”

“Too bad Theo didn’t bury the locket in the Bahamas,” Harry said wryly.

“The thing is,” Draco said, “the thing is you won’t tell me what it was that Professor Snape said, and you won’t run away with me to the tropics, and you — you woke me up screaming in the middle of the night. You were kicking the mattress, did you know that? And then I almost couldn’t get you to snap out of it. You — it’s obvious something’s wrong, and I’m supposed to play nice when Weasley has a go at me?”

It took Harry a few seconds to summon words. “It’s — look, forget about Ron. Though he sort of has a point, you could probably be helping Hermione and Theo more with the numbers —“

“You won’t tell me what Snape said!” Draco interrupted fiercely. “You won’t tell me. And it’s clearly not — Potter, you can’t be this dense. Do you know what you’re doing to me? I keep thinking, and thinking, and I’m not even sure, frankly, that I want to help anyone find Slytherin’s locket, because, because —“ he threw another pebble and gulped for air — “what if we find it and — do you know what you _looked_ like, you just, you look like you’re seeing a boggart, or worse, like a Dementor’s tapped you on the shoulder, and then you _put it away_, you put it away. You put it away and then you sort of smile. It’s killing me, and I —“

Harry, one hand on the rock for balance, one hand reaching for Draco’s cheek, kissed him.

“I —“ Draco said, actually trying to talk through the kiss, “I want you to —“

“Yeah?” Harry said, drawing back.

“I,” Draco said.

“Want?” Harry prompted, kissing him again.

When he pulled back this time, Draco was staring at him as though, instead of snogging him, Harry was breaking his heart.

Harry took a long, fortifying breath. He touched Draco’s jaw, the sharp jut of his chin, smoothed back the blond hair, dark with damp from the waterfall. He tugged on Draco’s wrist, made him slide across and off his perch, so that he was standing with his back to the boulder, and Harry had enough space to get down on his knees on the wet dirt.

“Harry,” Draco said, hoarsely.

It was a robe for travelling; the belt was easy to undo, full of knots that unravelled without much coaxing. Pushing cloth out of the way, Harry kissed the soft skin of Draco’s belly, and went lower.

“Harry,” said Draco again, fingers in Harry’s hair, shaking slightly.

Draco was warm and flushed pink, already hardening. Harry had no idea what he was doing. He licked the tip, then, experimentally, opened his mouth. Draco’s breath hitched.

There was the smell of sweat, the salt of skin. The taste of precum, when it came, took him slightly by surprise. Saliva ran down his chin; he wiped at it ineffectually; more followed.

Mostly, the sensation was of heat, wet and heavy and vulnerable. His knees were cold, and the rest of him was far too hot, boiling over. It was filthy how badly he wanted it. Draco, gasping into the darkening sky, pulled at his hair and jerked into his mouth, and Harry had to shove his spare hand into his own trousers, uncaring of how he looked.

Mostly, it was about being selfish. He knew he was being selfish, as Draco cried out and tried to pull him away and he stayed put instead, swallowing. Once he’d taken it all, he put his head against Draco’s partially clothed thigh and finished himself off. It didn’t take much. Draco’s fingers were still in his hair when he came.

God, how he wished he could stay there on his knees forever.

“Harry,” Draco said for the third time. Harry heard him murmuring spells to put them back together. “Get up.”

Harry didn’t move. He found his voice and said, bluntly, “I’ve been wanting to suck you off for a long time now.”

There was a loud silence. Then, “Get up, please,” and Harry found himself swaying onto his feet, persuaded by magic and Draco’s voice, which was begging.

“Come here,” Draco said, and folded Harry into his arms, where Harry, stupidly, felt tears march into his eyes.

“Oh,” Draco said, as Harry tried to stop crying and found that he could not. “Darling. Shh, it’s all right. It’s my fault; I should have done better. I should’ve — I should’ve thought about how awful this is for you, and not just about how hurtful it is for me. Harry? Harry, shh. I’ve got you. I’m here. It’s okay, it’s all right.”

It wasn’t, but Harry let himself be soothed anyway.

***

They found the locket on the sixth day.

There was no fanfare. Harry was walking with Draco at the back when Ron, a few paces ahead, said, “They’ve stopped.”

When they caught up Theo was turning on the spot, stomping with one foot on a patch of ground experimentally.

Hermione said, “This looks like it, doesn’t it? Look at those roots over there.”

“I think it’s here,” Theo said.

“We’ve got maybe an hour of daylight left,” Hermione told them.

It was chilly; everyone’s breath came out white and insubstantial. “Let’s start digging,” Harry said.

The first excavation yielded nothing, but Theo was insistent on the position, and Harry, who had seen the Pensieve memory enough times to know it by heart, agreed that the general spot was correct. So they widened the hole, and then widened it again, and again, and soon hit the edge of the box.

It was, as Harry remembered, a plain wooden box with rough edges that promised splinters. Being buried had not weathered it at all; nothing had touched the wood nor the simple metal latch, just as nothing had dulled the unpleasant aura of malevolence that radiated from within.

Theo tapped his wand on the latch. It sprung open.

“This is it, then?” said Ron expectantly.

Hermione was already retrieving a basilisk fang. She held it out to Theo, who backed away.

“Oh no,” he said hurriedly. “No, thank you. There was nothing in the Vow about that.”

Hermione pinned him with that judgemental look she had polished and perfected over the years. “Fine, suit yourself. I’ll do it. Unless anyone else would rather?”

“Go ahead,” Ron said. Harry nodded.

“One of you, hold the box still,” Hermione instructed. Ron hastened to obey.

The heavy golden locket died much like all the others: loudly. Harry, used to it by now, found himself thinking that it was all rather overblown and monstrous, that a mere piece of a so-called soul should go with such shrieking and yet a person, whole and complete, could pass on without sound or second chance.

“There,” Hermione said with satisfaction, as the last of the black smoke drifted away.

Harry felt something; an impact, like a drumbeat.

“Now we return to Hogwarts,” Hermione went on, “and plan the next — Harry?”

It was internal, in his head, behind his eyes. He shut them and tried to reinforce his Occlumency barriers, but the drumbeat, the echo of agony and fury, would not be quelled.

Draco’s hand was on his back. All of them were talking over each other. Harry wasn’t listening. He concentrated on the touch instead: Draco’s palm, his fingers, the pressure along Harry’s spine. He said, extracting the words through the pain, “Voldemort knows. He knows. He’s been looking and looking for the locket, unable to track its presence, but now he feels its absence, through the absence of all the others. He’s going to come here — you have to run —“

“Brooms,” Draco said urgently. “Nott, which way —“

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Theo said.

“Why ever not? Let’s get up high and fly out, and then we can activate the return Portkeys. Granger, hurry.”

“I know, Malfoy,” Hermione replied, already taking out the brooms.

Theo said, “My father, he might —“

“You can’t think he’d do something that will put you in danger?” Draco said, catching a broom.

They kicked up into the twilight. Hermione’s start was unsteady, and her ascent through the trees was slow and uncertain. Harry dropped back down to keep an eye on her, and was consequently the last one to breach the canopy and see what awaited them.

They were in the mountains; when they had been moving below that had been obvious in the terrain, in the flora, in the occasional vista of peaks. Yet now that they were above, all Harry could see in what remained of the light was a sea of identical trees, spreading flatly out toward the horizon. No mountains. Nothing, not even a slight change in elevation from one point to the next that could possibly help them in their navigation.

“Even the light is uniform,” Hermione murmured. “Which way was the sun setting, earlier? It was over there, wasn’t it?” She cast a spell, then frowned at her wand. “I can’t get any sense of direction.”

“It’s one of the protective wards,” Theo said, clearly panicking. “To prevent against thieves, you know, in case anyone did manage to get in. P-priceless works of art, and so on. Oh, fuck.”

“What triggered it?” Draco asked. “I thought —“

“My father,” Theo hissed. “That’s what triggered it. I told you, he might not have a choice. The same as your father, Draco — shall we talk about him?”

“We shan’t,” Harry told him, clipped. “Calm down and think. How do we get around this? If we choose a direction and fly, will we eventually get out?”

“I don’t know!” Theo said. “I’ve never seen this ward active before. I — what should we do? What should we do?”

There was a moment where all of them looked at each other, a circle of mirrored fear. Then, “The matches,” Draco said. “Potter, the matches. The ones Scrimgeour gave you. Remember? The note said they burn away deception. It might work.”

“I’ve got them,” Harry said, “I packed them — Hermione, can you — no wait, _Accio Verignis_.”

It took him two tries to light the first match. When it lit, his stomach dropped at how weakly it shone. Around him, the endlessly cloned forest remained unchanged.

“Look through the light,” Draco said at his elbow.

Harry held it up carefully and squinted. Very faintly, through the incomprehensibly shifting crystal refraction that was only tangentially like fire in that it assumed a similar shape, he saw a glimpse of a valley and a dip that might have been a river.

“It works,” he said, just as a gust of wind extinguished the match.

“Light another,” Hermione said. “I’ll shield it.” She held her wand ready.

“Would it be safer if we went back down?” Ron questioned. “They’ll find us immediately up here, especially if we’re twinkling like a star.”

“We’ll move too slowly, and make more noise,” Hermione objected. “And the matches might run out. We’ll have to chance it. Fly very low. Theo, help us figure out which way to go.”

“There are thirty-something matches,” Harry warned. “They don’t burn for very long.” He lit another and gave it to Theo to look through.

“That way,” Theo said tremulously, after a long deliberation that cost them three matches. “I think. It’s hard to see.”

It was getting darker and darker. They flew as fast as they dared, lighting match after match, for it became obvious after the first few that they needed to constantly verify their course — it was as though the space around them would shift if they did not keep an eye on it.

“As soon as we near the border,” Hermione said as they moved, “start checking to see if you can activate your Portkey. If it does activate — well, obviously, you’ll go. Whoever manages to go first will be the indication to the rest of us that it’s possible to do so. Therefore, it’s absolutely crucial you don’t hesitate. Trust that the rest of us will follow. When you land, apparate straight to Hogsmeade. Don’t wait. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Theo, who obviously didn’t need to be told twice.

There was an encouraging moment when Ron crashed into something that was largely invisible, which told them that the ward did have limits — it was at least partially an illusion, not a complete transformation.

It was only encouraging for a short while. “How much further?” Harry asked, as he handed Theo another match. They were down to single digits.

“It should be any moment now,” Theo responded, but instead of sounding assured he only seemed more frantic than ever.

“Start checking your Portkeys,” Hermione ordered.

As she finished speaking, Harry felt the hair on his neck rise. Turning, he was in time to see the jagged, malicious beam of a curse shoot towards them.

“Watch out!” he shouted, and drove his broom into Hermione’s to move her out of the way.

Noise erupted everywhere.

“The match!” Theo said.

Carried by gravity, it fell winking into the forest.

“Is everyone okay?” Harry yelled at the same time.

“I’m here, Harry,” came Draco’s reply.

“Fuck, Nott,” said Ron, “which way? Did you manage to see before you dropped it?”

Another curse cut through the sky, followed directly by another, and then suddenly the forest below was afire, flaring bright white and green, gold and pink.

It didn’t last long; in the next second the flames dulled to red, and smoke began to fill their nostrils.

But it had been enough. “That way,” Theo called. “It’s — can you see? It’s burnt away the illusion —“

“Harry Potter,” said a voice; the tone was of an empty coffin: anticipatory.

Voldemort.

“Go!” Harry cried. “Go, go!” He shoved at Hermione.

She flattened herself against her broom as he had taught her, picking up speed. They all hurtled toward the point Theo had indicated, and behind them came malignant shadows that did not belong to them, slinging spells.

Ron was the fastest, and the first to vanish. Theo was the next.

Draco was right behind them, and should have gone immediately as well, but he turned to look for Harry.

“Go,” Harry urged him desperately, fumbling at his own pocket for the stub of Muggle pencil that was his Portkey. “Draco, go.”

Hermione, between them, was trying to activate her own Portkey. She’d taken both hands off her broom to do it, and Harry could see her slipping perilously. Draco, following Harry’s line of vision, saw and banked sideways and back to grab her arm.

As he did so, Hermione said, distinctly, “_Portus_.”

It wasn’t quite the same as apparition, which meant that it was actually, in some cases, more dangerous to hold onto a person who was being transported by a Portkey without holding onto the same Portkey yourself. Draco had to make a split-second decision; the wrong choice would risk serious injury to both himself and Hermione.

He clapped his other hand on the Portkey.

Both of them vanished.

And then there was one.

“The Chosen One,” said Voldemort mockingly, and he was right there. “Always running away. _Imperio_.”

There was no direct command; it was, instead, a pressure of will that desired one thing: submission. Harry fought it off. It was more difficult than it had ever been; his head hurt so much. It took a long time. When his mind was his again, they were all motionless in the air. Harry, Voldemort, and three hooded Death Eaters, lit by the fire, obscured by the smoke. Harry coughed.

Voldemort was holding the pencil. His expression suggested mild amusement, but Harry, linked as he was through the scar and in such close proximity, could feel the broil of ugly emotion hidden not very far from the surface.

“It’s about time we put an end to this,” Voldemort said. “I grow tired of you.”

“Funny,” Harry retorted. “Is that a recent development? I’ve always been tired of you.”

“Where,” said Voldemort, “is the Elder Wand?”

“No clue,” Harry told him quite honestly.

“Occlumency barriers can be broken, boy. They will be.”

“Oh? Try, then.”

It was a bold boast, thrown out recklessly. There was still the last secret, which he had to guard — but it was always easier to defend against Legilimency if you knew it was coming.

“Try?” Voldemort repeated. “I will do more than that. I will consume your mind until it is my own.”

Instead of doing that, however, he tossed the pencil from hand to hand, examining it closely, then tapped it with his wand.

“Go fetch, Harry Potter,” he said, and threw.

Harry moved to avoid it.

He didn’t manage to. One of the Death Eaters, jeering, caught him with a spell that froze his limbs — a flash of sharp hot-cold pain before complete numbness — and the pencil caught him across the temple.

Instantly, he felt the usual sucking sensation, once alien and now familiar, except worse than he was used to, because he had been unprepared, and ten seconds later he was falling onto grass, retching and convulsing.

It was precious minutes before he regained control of himself. His head hurt so badly he could barely keep his eyes open. He cast a quick third year diagnostic spell. Nothing broken. Not very helpful.

He was at their arrival point near Dufftown. Voldemort had activated the Portkey, and given it to him for some reason. Why —

_Crack_.

Intercontinental apparition, Harry thought dazedly. Voldemort had somehow tracked the trajectory of the Portkey.

“I’m afraid that it will take my Death Eaters some time more to get back here,” Voldemort said conversationally. “So for now, you will perform for an audience of one. _Crucio_.”

Hermione had chosen a place removed from Muggles. They’d warded it to prevent accidental discovery. No one was coming to save him. No one could have saved him. Not from this. Never from this.

He screamed, lost breath, regained it, kept screaming.

Through it all, he was aware in the most peripheral part of his mind that Voldemort was speaking: about Dumbledore, about the Elder Wand, about Death (as though death were an entity), about all the things he would do to everyone Harry knew, once Harry was dead.

Harry realised — and how had he not noticed before — that the great churning miasma that was Voldemort’s state of mind was centred around terror.

Voldemort was afraid. Consumed by fear.

_This_ was the confirmation Dumbledore had hoped to extract from Slughorn, offered unwittingly from the source. Six Horcruxes. Seven pieces of the soul.

And one more.

Voldemort raised his wand. “How weak you are.”

Harry, choking for air, could not reply.

Voldemort continued, “Let us go, Harry Potter, to where your cowardly companions have gone. There’s only one possible place, no? Let us go, so that all can witness your fresh corpse at my feet. Bella is already there.”

A weight bore down on his skull. Voldemort’s foot, unclad. They apparated.

Hogsmeade, right in the middle of town. Voices shouting. Hexes. Curses. Crying. Flashing lights. A collective gasp of shock and then, for one blunt second, silence.

Laughter. Bellatrix’s cackle, unmistakable.

And: “Harry!” Draco, Hermione, Ron. Also unmistakable.

With great effort, Harry pushed himself onto his elbows. Voldemort let him, laughing with his Death Eaters. Blood ran down Harry’s cheek. Was it from the scar? He staggered upright and stumbled back, clutching his wand.

“Good people of Hogsmeade,” Voldemort said, projecting his voice. “Look at your saviour. Look at your champion. How could he have ever brought you peace? How could he save anyone? No: I will be the one. Join me, and we will bring peace, we will bring victory, we will bring freedom to the entirety of wizardkind.”

He cast a dome of warding around them, sealing off all interference.

“_No_.” Draco. “Harry, no.”

Harry didn’t try to find him in the crowd. Too late now.

Voldemort said: “Witness the end of a prophecy, and the rise of my true legacy.”

Voldemort said: “_Avada Kedavra_.”

Harry hated, and hated, and hated. He said in return: “_Avada Kedavra_.”

Eternity was there, turning its wheel between green and green. It was a narrow, starved space that lasted a lifetime and was, despite it all, far, far too short.

Voldemort had cast first.

And so Harry died.


	33. Chapter 33

“Harry,” said Lily. “Sweetheart. Are you all right?”

For a moment, her bright red hair was the only colour in the world. Harry blinked. He took her hand and steadied himself. She smiled at him; he smiled at her.

“Mum,” he said.

“Yes, my dear.” She righted his crooked glasses, and brushed his fringe with her fingertips. “Come now, we have a long way to go.”

They continued walking by the train tracks. Birds sang through the trees; a bug buzzed in the undergrowth. Lily was in jeans, a red-and-white striped t-shirt. A sun hat. Her nose was dotted with freckles, and his heart swelled to look at her. His own mother. Mum.

She sang a song. A Muggle song, he supposed. He didn’t recognise it. He hummed along to the chorus anyway, and she laughed delightedly and kissed his cheek.

She said, “I would have sung to you everyday. Oh, Harry. I _did_ sing to you everyday, all the days that I had.”

The tracks were rusty, disused and overgrown with wildflowers and weeds. They walked for what must have been miles, leaping from one side to the other, trying to balance on the rails and failing, laughing without end. It all felt very easy. He didn’t run out of breath no matter what he did, and in fact he hardly noticed his body at all.

“We’re coming to the bridge soon,” Lily said. “James is waiting for us on the other side. Can you hear it? The water.”

The track curved, and Harry did hear it. The roar, and something else. A pitiful wailing that made a sour taste rise in the back of his throat.

He could see from Lily’s face that she had heard it too.

The bridge when they came to it was balanced on high archways, grey bricks. On the left of it was a giant frothing waterfall. The spray from it coated the rails and the spaces between the tracks so that the path was filled with shallow puddles. When he tried to look over the bridge, Lily stopped him.

“It’s dangerous,” she warned, serious.

“But the wailing,” he said, frowning. “It’s coming from underneath.”

“Leave it, Harry.”

He couldn’t see the other side of the bridge. He said, “Mum.” He said, “I waited for him to cast first. I made sure I was one syllable behind. That was the right decision, wasn’t it?”

She looked at him without speaking for a long time. Finally, she said, “I can’t answer that for you, sweetheart. I’m over here, not over there.”

They were still walking. “You mean that you’re dead.” Step by step. “And now I’m dead as well.” He kicked at a puddle, watched the drops of water sparkle. “I didn’t want to die.”

“No one does,” Lily agreed. “I didn’t, either. Even when I was — even then, with you. I wanted to live. I wanted to live for you, and for James, and for myself.”

“But it was Voldemort’s fear of death that drove him to do all of those things,” Harry said, not quite sure why he felt the need to make the point but making it anyway.

“Just because Voldemort feared death does not mean that it is therefore noble and just and wise to embrace it,” Lily replied. She stopped, and he stopped too.

“I just thought —“ Harry looked away from her — “I thought a lot about you, and how you sacrificed your life for me. I thought that — when it came to it, I thought …”

“That you would be more accepting of it?”

“I — yes, I suppose.” Harry laughed sheepishly. “I just, you know, I was surprised. I was angry and full of hatred, actually, there at the end. I was — I don’t know how to explain it. I knew I had to do it, and I, I’d decided to do it. I knew the sacrifice would be worth it. I wanted to do it, but I — I still _didn’t_ want to. I didn’t want to, Mum.”

“You did it anyway,” she said.

He nodded.

“When you are in a warm place, or think there could be the promise of a warm place, you want to go there, to stay there, to never leave.”

He nodded again.

“That’s how it is, I think,” Lily said, gently, kindly.

“Dumbledore said that — that death is the next great adventure.”

“Ah.” Lily crossed her arms, tilted her head to the side. “He said that to me too, once.”

“Is it?” Harry wanted to know. “The next great adventure?”

She didn’t answer. She smiled, but it was a solemn smile. She said, “Harry, will you come with me across the bridge to see James, or will you stay, and go back?”

He took a step forward. Stopped. “I can go back?”

“I believe so. Everyone gets that choice.”

“You mean I’ll be a ghost.”

“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “The Killing Curse when cast kills one thing, only one thing.” The wailing grew louder. “This Killing Curse hit two things. Maybe you have a chance.”

“Someone else said to me that a ghost is a regret chained to the earth.”

Lily smiled wider. She’d been smiling so much, like she couldn’t bear to stop.

“You and Dad never came back as ghosts,” Harry reminded her.

“No,” she said. “I think … I think it would have been horrible. Haunt Godric’s Hollow? No.”

“I don’t want to be a ghost.”

Lily was quiet. Patient.

“But I,” Harry said, “I don’t want to cross this bridge, either.”

He realised that he was waiting for her to tell him what to do. It was such a novel concept, having his mum tell him what to do. She loved him. She would look after him. Guide him.

But Lily only said: “It’s your choice. If you go back, you might have a chance. Or you might not.”

“How long do I have to decide?”

She shrugged. “Perhaps as long as it would take for this waterfall to run out of water.”

“So, forever?”

“Here, an ocean can change to a desert in the blink of an eye.”

“Then no time at all?”

Lily wrapped an arm around his shoulders, and, playfully, took off her hat and put it on his head. “You have a little while, Harry. Less than forever, longer than nothing.”

“Will you stay with me, while I think it over?”

“Will I?” she said softly, and stared at him with such sorrow in her eyes that he knew she meant yes.

***

The platform was crowded, full of students and their parents and possibly their parents’ parents. Everyone, it seemed, was pushing a trolley piled with trunks and other things, like broomsticks and cages with animals. One group of boys had a large spider. It was the size of a puppy, and about as fluffy.

Harry had run through the barrier between platform 9 and platform 10 with extreme trepidation, after seeing two other people with owls do it first. He’d thought that he was hallucinating. He’d had doubts about ever finding platform 9¾.

He certainly had no doubts now. All of these weird strangers were clearly magical.

He was trying to work out the logistics of carrying the hat and his trunk and Hedwig’s cage (with Hedwig in it, hooting indignantly at all the other owls) up the narrow steps of the train by himself when a gruff but still boyish voice said behind him, “Oi, get a move on, will ya?”

The boy was much taller than him, and broader, too. But his cheeks were pink with baby fat, which sort of ruined the picture of intimidation he was trying to project.

“Sorry,” Harry said. “Er. It’s a bit — hang on, I’m trying …”

“Give it here,” said the boy, and, with effortlessness Harry envied, lifted Harry’s trunk and set it inside the train. “There.”

“Thanks!” Harry said brightly. “Oh, um.” He stuck out his hand. “Harry.”

“Greg,” said Greg, slapping his hand instead of shaking it properly. “Now will you hurry up and get in?”

“Er, yeah. Sorry.”

The corridor inside was extremely narrow. Harry put the hat on Hedwig’s cage, trying to soothe her, and balanced the cage on top of his trunk. He peered into the first compartment. A group of girls much older than him glanced at him dismissively. One of them was floating a magazine in midair, pointing at a spread of a model who was preening at the camera. The model winked at Harry. It was all much more intimidating than Greg had been. He hurried on.

Every compartment was occupied. Even when he found one that looked like it had a few spare seats, he was informed upon attempting to enter that he was not welcome. (The exact words had been, “First-year huh? Yeah, no. Keep walking, mate.”)

Harry was getting a little discouraged.

“Oi, what’re you slowing down even more for?” Greg complained from behind him. “Last compartment, go on.”

“It’ll be occupied,” Harry said, pushing his trunk over to check.

The door slid open just as he reached it.

“Goyle,” drawled the blond boy who had opened it. He sounded very smug and full of himself. Harry recognised him at once. “There you are.” The boy noticed Harry. “Oh, hello. It’s you, isn’t it, from Malkin’s? Merlin, what are you wearing?”

Harry plucked at the oversized hand-me-down shirt self-consciously. “Er.”

“Well?” said the boy, raising an eyebrow. “Are you going to get in, or will you keep blocking the corridor like a great big Muggle?”

Harry got in.

“Goyle,” said the boy, and snapped his fingers at Harry’s trunk.

“Aye,” Greg said, and picked it up to put it into the overhead luggage area.

“Thanks, Greg,” Harry said.

The blond boy, who was apparently not done with his bossy rampage of bossiness, said to Harry, “You should let your owl out. He’ll enjoy flying to Hogwarts much more than he will being stuck in here with us all day.”

“Oh,” Harry said.

“_Oh_,” the boy repeated, rolling his eyes. “You didn’t think of that, did you?” He opened the window and gestured imperiously.

He was utterly insufferable, but Hedwig seemed pleased. She hooted at Harry and nipped his finger affectionately, then took off.

“I expect I’ll have to take care of you, too,” said the boy with a dramatic and completely undeserved sigh, finally sitting down. He nodded at the other boy sitting opposite him, who was occupied with eating through an entire bag of sweets. “This is Crabbe. Vincent Crabbe. And you’ve met Goyle, I suppose. I’m Draco Malfoy. You can call me Malfoy, of course. What’s your name?”

“Er,” Harry said, sitting down as well, in the far corner. He put the hat on his lap. “I’m Harry.”

“Harry?”

“Yeah?”

Draco glared at him with annoyance. “Harry _what_, exactly?”

“Oh. Potter. Harry Potter.”

Vincent dropped his sweets.

“Hey,” protested Greg. “Don’t give me that look, Malfoy. He didn’t say. I didn’t know.”

“You’re Harry _Potter_,” Draco said. “_The_ Harry Potter? If you’re lying —“

“I’m not!” Harry said, offended.

“Prove it,” Draco ordered. “Where’s your scar? Show me.”

Harry was getting tired of this. He put his hand on his forehead stubbornly. “Why should I?”

“Why should you —“ Draco appeared, for one blessed moment, to be at a loss for words. “Why — because you look nothing like Harry Potter!”

“Excuse me,” Harry said, because this was just ridiculous, “I’ve always looked like myself.”

“Harry Potter is a celebrated hero,” Draco went on, talking over him. “His name will go down the ages. He’s — he’s in _books_. And you,” he added, pointing rudely, “have broken glasses.”

“I fixed them as best as I could!” He could go and buy new ones now, couldn’t he, now that he had money in Gringotts? He would have to ask Hagrid.

“No you didn’t,” Draco contradicted. “What did you use, spellotape? Why? Don’t you know the incantation? It’s _Occulus Reparo_.”

“Um,” Harry said.

“Well?” prompted Draco. Was his eyebrow stuck permanently in that position, or what? Harry wanted to _Occulus Reparo_ his _face_.

Instead, he got out his wand and looked at it nervously.

“All you have to do is tap the glasses and say it,” Draco said.

Whatever. Fine. Hoping he wasn’t about to turn himself into a goldfish or something, Harry tapped his glasses once and said, “_Occulus Reparo_.”

There was a little zinging sensation. His glasses gave a tiny _pop_ and fixed themselves.

“Wow,” Harry said. He took them off to check, then put them back on, unthinkingly brushing his fringe aside in the process. He’d done _magic_.

“Salazar’s secrets,” breathed Draco. “You actually are Harry Potter.”

“That’s a lightning bolt, all right,” grunted Greg, bending over to pick up a piece of chocolate. Vincent had dropped his sweets for the second time.

Right then, the train blew its horn and began to move.

“Salazar,” said Draco again, eyes open as wide as they could go. It made him look very comical. “I’m on the train to Hogwarts with Harry Potter. _Harry Potter._“

Harry scowled at him. “Are you going to keep going on about it?”

“What?” Draco huffed instantly. “No, of course not. I was only — so what, you’re Harry Potter. Who cares. Do you know who _I_ am?”

“You said your name was Draco, right?”

“_Malfoy_,” Draco insisted.

“Malfoy,” Harry allowed, shrugging.

“My father,” Draco said with the air of a grand announcement, “is very important.”

“Okay,” Harry said.

There was a short pause.

Draco cleared his throat. “Anyway. Goyle. Did you end up finding Parkinson?”

“She’s gone to sit with the Patil twins,” Greg replied.

“Oh, I see. So it’s just us, then.”

“Yep,” said Greg.

Another pause.

“You should really change into your robes,” Draco drawled. “Those things you’re wearing are absolutely horrendous.”

“Stop telling me what to do,” Harry said irritably. “I’ll change when I please, thank you very much.”

“Potter,” Draco said, and he lingered a little on the name like he wasn’t sure if he was saying it correctly, “I’m trying to look out for you. You can’t let people see you dressed like that.”

“Malfoy knows best,” Greg agreed.

“Does he?” Harry wondered obstinately.

“Is it true you were raised in the wilderness by Muggles?” Vincent asked suddenly, speaking for the first time.

Before Harry could respond, the compartment door opened. Hermione was there, with Longbottom.

The world disintegrated, reformed. Hermione? Longbottom?

He’d never met them before. He knew who they were. Of course he did. He was meeting them now.

Hermione said, “Pardon me, we’re looking for a toad. Has anyone here seen a toad? No? Well, if you do see it, it belongs to Neville Longbottom, and of course you’ll do the right thing and tell a teacher.” She gave them all a critical once-over and closed the door.

Yes, that was how it had happened.

When Harry turned back to Draco, it was a different Draco.

Draco said, voice deeper, hair longer, tone fonder, “Harry, where did you get that hat?”

The compartment was otherwise empty. No trunks. No Greg or Vince. It was dark outside the windows. Too dark.

Harry picked up the sun hat from his lap, feeling the weave of the straw, the promise of summer. “Mum gave it to me.”

He lingered on the hat too long. When he looked up again, Draco was gone, too.

***

He wandered around for a long time in the dark. He couldn’t see anything, couldn’t feel anything. He could only hear, far off, the sound of a train: _ka-tunk, ka-tunk_. It was moving away from him, always, constantly, moving away from him.

_Ka-tunk, ka-tunk_.

Was he meant to board it?

Could he not let it go?

***

Elsewhere, he was lost in a house.

There was nothing in the house, just corridor after corridor and doors upon doors. Every door looked the same. Every room looked the same. There were no windows.

He was lost, he was lost; he was lost here yesterday and he would be lost here tomorrow. Tomorrow? What day was it?

It was frightfully cold, and he had nothing to wear. He went from door to door, fearful of the metal handles, which were so cold to the touch that they hurt.

He thought that one of the doors must be different. One of them would be warm.

He just needed to find it.

***

Elsewhere, he was on a bridge. The waterfall was still falling, but it could stop at any moment.

Lily said, “I’ll tell James for you that he’ll have to wait some more.”

Harry handed her back her hat, watched her put it on.

Lily said, “I hope we’ll wait an age, Harry. I hope we’ll wait a long, long time.”

***

Still elsewhere, but this time in the right place, he woke up.


	34. Chapter 34

Crisp hospital sheets, worn thin from multiple Scouring Charms. Potions, clinking glass. Voices, somewhere.

It was pink behind his eyelids. Too bright beyond.

He kept them closed.

***

The next time he woke up, it was night. It was snowing. Pansy was sitting in a chair beside his bed, leaning back, her legs propped up on his bedframe. She was flipping through _Witch Weekly_. An old photo of Harry was on the cover, looking decidedly reluctant about being there.

“Pansy,” he tried to say, and didn’t quite manage.

Still, she heard him. Her head snapped up from the magazine and she went first white, then red. “Oh, fuck,” she said. “Oh fuck. Oh, Merlin. Fuck. Harry? Harry! Wait, _wait_.” She took out a galleon and tapped it with her wand. “Oh fuck. Draco’s going to — you arse. You complete arse. Can you hear me? Of course you can hear me. Nod if you can hear me.”

“I can hear you,” Harry croaked.

“Fuck,” Pansy said again. “Do you know how _long_ — do you — Draco’s been practically _living_ in here, he’s been living in here, and the whole time you — I get him, finally, to leave for one day — twelve hours on the _dot_, he said — and you, you — fuck.” She scrunched up the magazine, stood up, leaned down, and kissed him. On his forehead, then on his mouth.

The door burst open.

Pansy jumped. “It’s not what it looks like!” she said with precisely zero gravitas. Harry had never seen her so giddy before.

“Parkinson, this better not be —“ Draco said at the same time, and stopped.

Draco looked grey. His hair was unbrushed and lank, his eyes were sunken. His cheekbones were so prominent they were practically cutting through his skin. He’d lost all his weight.

“Harry,” he said, very faintly, like he’d just been punched and was winded. Then he said to Pansy, “What do you mean, it’s not what it looks like? He’s awake.”

“I meant the kissing,” Pansy said primly.

“You can kiss him all you want,” Draco told her. “But first you can leave. Tell Granger, but I — I need —“

“I know, darling,” said Pansy. “I’ll take care of it.” She gazed at Harry for a few seconds more, then turned and left, closing the door noiselessly.

Draco sat on the bed. He touched Harry’s face, his chest, his mouth, his arm, his hand. The movements were uncoordinated and agitated.

“Hey,” Harry said, rasping.

“Water,” Draco said at once. There was an empty glass on the bedside table. He filled it. “Can you — let me help you.”

He could have done it with magic, but instead he did it by hand, lifting Harry up so that he could drink.

“So,” Harry said, once he’d drunk it all, “Pansy can kiss me all she wants, huh?”

“It’s not like anyone can stop her,” replied Draco. He wasn’t blinking very much. His eyes were red.

Harry, with huge effort, moved his right arm so that it came in contact with Draco’s wrist. “No?”

“Harry,” Draco said, “you’re —“

“— supposed to be dead?”

“— alive.” And his head came down on Harry’s chest. He shook. “You’re alive.” He kept saying it.

It was terribly uncomfortable. Harry said, after a while of this, “Draco.” No response. “_Draco_.”

Draco went silent.

“If you’re going to do this, can you get off? No, I mean — look, get under the sheets, will you? You look like you need sleep.”

“I don’t want to sleep,” Draco mumbled. But he switched position, and got under the sheets. He lay on his side and put his head right back on Harry’s chest, at the exact same spot as before.

The only light came from a few floating candles by the far wall. Harry said, “Why don’t you want to sleep?”

“I don’t know if I’m dreaming,” Draco said. “What if I sleep, and wake up?”

“Pansy says you’ve been living in this room.”

“Pansy needs to mind her own bloody business, for once.”

“Draco, you’re not dreaming. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. You can sleep.”

“When I got to you,” Draco said in a dull monotone, like the only way he could say this was by hammering all emotion out of it, “you weren’t breathing. Your heart had stopped. Your eyes were — you looked, you looked dead. You were dead. _He_ was dead as well. And I — I … everyone was saying, you were a hero. They were celebrating; they wanted to plan a funeral. They — your wand, your wand was still warm. It was still warm days after, and no one would believe me. Even the ones who did believe me, wouldn’t believe that it meant anything. Sometimes the magic lingers, they said, like I was five years old and didn’t know.” His voice took on some colour. “Of course it lingers for some people, but not for _days_, and not — not with another wand. I tried it, you know. My acacia wand has always liked you. I put it in your hand, and there was a reaction.” He shifted, finding Harry’s left hand and bringing it to his lips. He didn’t kiss it or anything, just held it there. “I’m not sleeping.”

“Okay,” Harry acknowledged. “But — I might sleep, all right? I’m exhausted.”

“I can hear your heartbeat now,” Draco said. “That’s enough.”

***

“We all thought he was going mad,” Hermione confessed to him the next day. “Even I thought — well, he _was_ going mad. Even if he was right.” She blew her nose and wiped once more at her eyes. “Oh, Harry, he was right. I’m so glad that —“ and she hugged him again.

It was the first twenty minutes they’d gotten alone. Draco had still been there when Harry had stirred awake at midday, and he’d refused to leave, not while the astonished healers were performing their checks, not while Harry was fed a series of potions, not while a troupe of well-wishers came to see Harry’s miraculous revival for themselves.

Someone had gone to get Narcissa. She had come into the room, ruined throat unconcealed for all to see, and, voiceless, made a gesture: come here. And Draco, to his _mother_, had said, “No.” But then, in the face of her stony, unbroken silence: “Okay, fine. Yes, Mother. All right. Half an hour.”

“Tell me,” Harry had said to Hermione, “everything that happened.”

So she did. He’d been — dead — for two months, just about. And Harry had stopped her right there and said, two months? Two months, she confirmed. That was difficult to process. Where had he been? Hermione wanted to know, and then said, no that’s not the correct question, and he’d said, I was trying to find my way back. I was lost. I didn’t want to be a ghost. It was dark. It was cold.

Two months. No wonder Draco had looked like that.

Harry had killed Voldemort. The Death Eaters had fled. Most of them had been caught. Bellatrix Lestrange had committed suicide. And Scrimgeour, Scrimgeour had been found, deep in the bowels of Malfoy Manor, half-eaten by Dementors. They were treating him in the Janus Thickey Ward —

No, Harry had interrupted. Tell me about Draco. Tell me about you. The rest can come later.

Draco had fought, alone, against all of them — first to delay Harry’s funeral temporarily, then permanently, and then to move Harry off the funereal slab they’d placed him on and onto a hospital wing bed. He’d raved on and on about the wand, and no one had believed him, because the truth had been obvious. The truth had been obvious, but Draco had refused to listen, and he started sleeping — or rather, not sleeping, but just living, existing — in Harry’s room, so there was no way for anyone to retrieve Harry’s body unless it was by force, and Draco had made it crystal clear that he was not beyond using lots and lots of force. He’d broken Pomfrey’s arm. The papers had been very sympathetic about it in the beginning, printing story after story about the heartwrenching drama of it all. The Boy Who Lived and Died, and his friend who was inconsolable — and so on. But gradually, predictably, the narrative had changed, taking on a negative tone. Had the Malfoy boy completely lost his mind? Draco had become something of a pariah. Except now he had been vindicated.

Hermione herself had kept busy. She’d — she’d gotten by. There was a lot to do. Did Harry want to hear about the politics around Azkaban? Later? She would tell him later. But she had to keep busy, because if she didn’t — if she didn’t — she’d remember he was lying here in this room, and then she wouldn’t be able to get anything done at all.

Ron was fine. Harry had seen him amongst the stream of visitors already. There had been a lot of back-thumping and joking and, once the other two were manfully out of the way, a few genuinely tearful hugs. Ginny and the rest of the Weasleys were fine, too. But a number of people were missing — they’d gone into hiding, and had had no contact with anyone. They were probably safe, Hermione insisted. If they weren’t, then — she couldn’t say. Vincent had been found, though. A lot of Slytherins were coming back.

Some of them never would. Selwyn-Hester was dead. Hermione remembered him; they’d talked at one of Slughorn’s parties.

The castle, day to day, was in a chaotic recovery mode. Classes were suspended. Hermione didn’t think they would resume until next year. They would have to delay their NEWTs, or perhaps take them over the summer.

And Draco, Draco had been right …

“The biggest fight was when he told the healers they couldn’t put stasis charms on you,” Hermione said presently. “He was yelling himself hoarse about how they would keep you from waking. The healers were practically in tears telling him that you, you were going to start rotting. They wanted to encase you in ice as a compromise.” She choked out a laugh. “Draco was having none of it. He wouldn’t let them, and when you didn’t — didn’t rot after all, there were all these rumours about how he was — Harry, oh, it’s horrible to say — people thought he was practicing some sort of dark alchemy to god knows what end. Even I, on particularly bad days —“ She stopped, nodding at a thick stack of notes on a side table. “He did try some things, but he never seemed convinced that any of it was helping, and I don’t think it did.”

“You call him Draco now,” Harry observed.

“Yes, well. I was one of those people fighting him, you know. I came in almost every day to try and persuade him to let us — let us send you on. And one of those times. Oh, Harry. One of those times, I opened the door and he was there, his ear against your chest, and he saw me and he said, ‘Granger, I thought I heard something,’ and he just, he didn’t look like Malfoy, you know? He looked like Draco. He looked like how you sound when you say his name. He said, ‘Hermione, please. I really did.’ He said that.”

The windows had no glass, just some charms to keep in the heat and keep out the cold. A few flakes of snow blew in and turned into rain.

Harry said, “It’s been half an hour, hasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Hermione said, and added, as they heard footsteps, “Here he is.”

“Granger,” said Draco, as soon as he entered. “McGonagall wants you in her office.”

“Does she?” questioned Hermione. “Or are you just trying to get rid of me?”

“Both.”

Hermione sighed. “I’ll drop by again later.” She squeezed Harry’s hand and left.

“You look better,” Harry said to Draco.

“I ate some food. I washed. I cut my nails. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

“You were blurry last night. You’ve gone all sharp. Sit down, will you? No, not on the chair. Here. Turn around.”

“What?” Draco demanded. “What is it?”

“Hermione brought me a comb,” Harry said. “You ate food, washed, cut your nails. Your hair’s still unbrushed. Let me, will you?”

Draco’s back was stiff. “If Granger gave you a comb, she meant for you to use it on your own morbid bird’s nest, Potter.”

“We all know that’s a lost cause.” The comb caught on Draco’s fine hair, as matted as it was, and wet too from the bath. Harry put it down and used his fingers instead. That was easier. The potions he’d been made to drink had restored his ability to move remarkably quickly, but he was finding certain actions difficult if he did not focus fully on the execution. It was like he had forgotten how to inhabit a body. The healers had assured him that it would pass. They’d explained — or theorised, rather, while asking him lots of questions he couldn’t answer — that while he had been dead his body had not actually consumed any resources, so to speak. His muscles had not atrophied significantly. His hair had not grown. And all without the aid of stasis charms. He should have given way to the natural course of things, Bluewell had said. But he had not. It was sort of creepy, if he thought about it. He tried not to.

The snow kept coming in and turning into rain. Draco’s back gradually relaxed. When his hair was all untangled, Harry dried it with a spell.

“It’s really long,” he said.

“Do you want me to tie it back?” Draco asked.

“No. Or: yes, if you want. I’ll like it either way.”

Draco’s breath hitched. Harry put his arms around him, and, gently but purposefully, arranged them so that Draco’s head was again on his chest.

They lay there, holding each other. The candles burnt very low.

“Can you tell me now?” Draco whispered. “What Snape told you.”

“He told me,” Harry said simply, “that I was a Horcrux.”

Draco’s grip on his shoulder tightened.

“So I thought,” Harry continued, “I thought … I had a plan, you see. To have him kill me, and to kill him right after. I had to time the curse exactly. I didn’t think it had much chance of working. I thought it more likely I’d die without being able to finish it.”

“That night,” Draco murmured, “when you had the nightmare. You kept talking about the future as though you weren’t in it. I noticed, after. In this room.”

“Do you understand why I didn’t tell you?”

“Because you were selfish,” Draco said at once. “You wanted to save me.”

“You don’t think I didn’t tell you because I was afraid of what you might’ve done, how you might’ve reacted?”

“That, too, maybe. That would be how you rationalised it. But actually, you just really, really didn’t want to. You were thinking of me so much you were only thinking of yourself.”

Harry laughed. “You say such nonsense.”

“It’s the truth. It’s how I am when I think of you.”

Harry breathed him in, the scent of him, which at that moment was mostly the smell of his stupid special shampoo. “When you said we should live together, and that you might learn the harp, all of that — Draco, did you mean it?”

Draco moved as though to sit up, but seemed unable to convince himself to complete the action. He lay back down. He said, “At the time, yes.”

“But now? Do you still?”

“Still what? Want to learn the harp? Maybe. There’s the violin, too. Perhaps the viola.”

“You’re avoiding the question.”

“I am. Because I haven’t been able to think about it. And right now I don’t want to think about it.”

“Selfish,” Harry said.

“Right now, I only want to think about you.” Draco’s tone was earnest, contemplative. Then it changed, as though he couldn’t bear the weight of his own solemnity. “Just you, Potter, you brute, and all the insane crap you’ve put me through.” He paused. “I’ve always been selfish.”

“Yes,” Harry agreed, because he knew what Draco was really trying to say. “You always have.”

***

“Right,” Pansy said, leaning her hip on his desk, right on the letter he was trying to compose. “I’ve put together your schedule for the new year.”

“You’ve what?” Harry said, putting down his quill.

He’d moved back into the dungeons, into a set of private rooms that the castle had added. Having the lake outside the windows calmed him down. He’d considered the Slytherin dormitories, but decided against it in the end. They were still, for the most party, eerily empty.

“Your schedule,” Pansy repeated. “You have so many interview and photoshoot requests, surely you don’t mean to manage them on your own?”

“Oh, good,” Harry said with relief. “You’ve been looking through my owls.” He’d been considering setting the whole lot on fire.

“Of course I have, Harry.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I don’t want to do any interviews.”

Pansy frowned at him. “I know you don’t. But you need to.”

“At the moment, I don’t care what people think.”

“Yes, yes, obviously. You’ve risen from the dead. You killed the Dark Lord. They’ll print your praises until they run out of ink. But for Draco’s sake, darling, you have to do the interviews. Do you know the kinds of things he’s endured over the last few weeks?”

“I … Hermione mentioned something about the headlines. Draco hasn’t said anything.”

Pansy scoffed. “Why would he? He was the only one who believed you might not be completely dead when you were indistinguishable from a fresh corpse, but now that you’re alive again he’s the only one who seems uncertain that it’s real. He’ll never complain about anything when he’s in that sort of state.”

“Yeah,” Harry said in an undertone. “No — I agree. You’re right. I’m worried about him.”

“Where is he, by the way? Hasn’t he moved into these rooms as well?”

“He’s gone to sit with Narcissa.”

“Ah.”

“I’ll do the interviews.”

“Perfect,” Pansy said. She looked down. “Who are you writing to?”

“Selwyn-Hester’s family,” Harry said. “He was one of the last casualties, in the battle at Hogsmeade. If I’d — been faster, or, I don’t know. I feel responsible. I wish he’d gone back to Austria.”

“It was everyone’s war, Harry.”

Harry smiled up at her tiredly.

She patted his hand. “It’s New Year’s Eve, don’t forget. Will you come to dinner? Shall I send someone to escort you?”

“I’ll be there, Pansy.”

***

Truth be told, Harry had been avoiding almost everyone since his — recovery. Whenever someone new saw him they went through the same motions of disbelief, awe and, frequently, hero-worship, and it made him feel vaguely unwell each time, almost like he hadn’t found his way back to his body after all. It could have easily gone very differently, and in any case being waylaid every two seconds was extraordinarily taxing.

He used the Cloak a lot. It was becoming a bad habit. Sometimes when he was walking down a corridor, invisible, he would seize up by a door or a window in blind panic, and he would be over there again, listening to an impossible waterfall, trying to find a way out, anxious that he had missed a train —

It would pass. It had to pass.

He’d been planning to use the Cloak to make his way to the Great Hall, too, but as he was getting ready to leave, Draco returned.

“Oh,” he said, blinking. “Potter. I thought you’d gone to dinner.”

His hair was tied back. Some of it had come loose at his temple.

Harry said, “I was just about to go now. We can go together.”

“Oh,” said Draco again. “I’m not going, I don’t think. I’d rather get some sleep.” He yawned to demonstrate.

“You won’t get any sleep,” Harry told him. “If you’ll even try. You’ll lie in bed for hours and hours and hours and then when the party is over you’ll come and find me and bruise my wrist.”

Draco’s brow furrowed. “Bruise your wrist?”

Harry slid back his sleeve. “From yesterday.” More accurately, from yesterday night, when Harry had stirred awake to find Draco, in the liminal state between consciousness and unconsciousness, curled up against him and cutting off circulation to his hand with a bony, iron grip. His thumb had been on Harry’s pulse.

Draco got out his wand. “I’ll heal it.”

“No,” Harry said.

“You’re not making any sense.”

“Draco,” Harry said gently, stepping closer. “Come with me, please?”

“I don’t have anything appropriate to change into,” Draco said ridiculously.

“What you have on is fine.” Harry took his hand, held it firm.

He could feel Draco steeling himself all throughout the walk up to the ground floor, with the result being that once they were actually in the thick of it, Draco had put together enough of a self-confident, smiling facade that he almost seemed quite normal. He made small talk and snide comments, raised his goblet to toasts, and even clapped with all the rest when McGonagall made a speech about Harry.

As the clock wound closer to midnight, the tables were cleared and Banished, and people began to dance. Someone, probably Flitwick, charmed a thousand tiny motes of light into the air, which twinkled not like stars but rather like Muggle disco balls.

“Harry!” Ginny called, grinning, coming over from the other side of the Hall. “Dance with me?”

“He’s really bad at dancing, Weasley,” Draco informed her, and pushed Harry’s back. “Go on.”

He only trod on Ginny’s feet once. She was a good sport about it. They danced through two songs together, and might have gone for a third if they hadn’t been interrupted by a muscular man Harry didn’t recognise. He was, as Harry learned, Ginny’s new boyfriend.

“John, Harry,” Ginny said. “Harry, John. Say hello.”

“Hi,” Harry said.

“I was in the year above you,” said John. “Gryffindor.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Harry replied.

“It’s great that you’re setting an example for all Slytherins,” John remarked.

“Er,” said Harry.

“John’s got a younger brother in Slytherin,” Ginny supplied helpfully. “Second-year. Titchy little guy. Know him?”

Harry had no idea. Draco was the prefect, the one who knew things like this, but when he went to procure Draco’s assistance, Draco wasn’t where he had left him.

Someone else asked him to dance. He told them not now.

He had to walk around half the Hall — getting stopped every few feet by people who either wanted to dance or shake his hand or both — before he found Draco. He was sitting on one of the Banished tables, talking to Astoria Greengrass.

Harry hovered some distance away, unsure what to do. Astoria was crying.

She wasn’t making a big deal of it or anything. There were just tear tracks on her face. She was still speaking in that reserved manner she had.

“Harry,” said a voice at his elbow. “Eavesdropping?”

It was Theo. Harry wrinkled his nose.

“You really don’t like me, huh?” Theo said.

“You smell like alcohol,” Harry told him curtly. “But also, yes.”

“All because I made a practical suggestion in a life-or-death situation.”

“And other things.”

“Other things.” Theo exchanged his empty glass for a full one from the table. The empty one promptly vanished. The house-elves were outdoing themselves. “Essentially the same thing. You love him so much.”

Astoria said something that made Draco smile. He held out his hand to her, and they went as one to the dance floor.

“You think he’ll marry her?” Theo asked.

Harry shrugged.

“What was it like, being dead?”

“What an original question,” Harry said sarcastically. “No one’s asked me that at all in the past week.”

“You can’t blame people for being curious.”

“You can’t blame me for being over it.”

Theo snorted. “What was it like?”

“You’ll find out one day.”

“I’m asking as an intellectual.”

“Here’s an intellectual answer, then: fuck off.”

Theo burped, teetered, and ended up sitting on the ground. From this new vantage point he said, succinctly, “No.”

Harry thought about going somewhere else. Instead, he said, “You’re an only child, aren’t you?”

“What of it?”

“And pureblood.”

“Ooh,” Theo said. “Yeah.”

Harry picked up a glass and drank.

“If you ask me,” said Theo, burping again, “it’s all a load of rubbish.”

“What?”

“It was my great-uncle, you know, who came up with the Pureblood Directory. Sacred Twenty-Eight, et cetera. Bollocks.”

Harry stared at him. “You don’t…?”

“I mean, it’s true in the sense that these family trees go back for generations and generations,” Theo continued, swirling his drink at a dangerous angle. “But on the whole, I think: bollocks. All those large, empty houses. You can’t even find which painting your dead mother’s gone into, sometimes. Who cares for that sort of thing? Not me.”

Another person came to ask Harry to dance. Harry said no thanks.

“I s’pose I’ll marry a pureblood witch eventually. When I’ve done everything I want to. And then I’ll, yeah, I’ll carry on the line. Why not.” Theo giggled, burping for the third time. “Don’t see why Draco’s so bothered, though. I mean, he’s got you.”

Because Theo was very drunk, Harry felt safe in saying, “He’ll always have me, whatever he does.”

Theo scrunched up his face. “That’s really stupid.”

“How so?”

“Say he marries Astoria. What’re you going to do? Make him cheat on his wife?”

“He’d never do that. I’d never do that.”

“Then what? You gonna hover around him for the rest of his life? Please. You’ll get on with your own life. Feelings fade.”

“Do they?”

“How else do you think people survive?”

“Is that what we do?” Harry said slowly. “Survive?”

“Most of us.”

Further down the table, Harry spied Ron. He waved. Ron waved back.

“If he wants to marry Astoria,” Harry said, “I’m not going to stop him. He’s his own person.”

Theo laughed uproariously. “Merlin.”

“What’s so funny?” said Ron, coming over. He had a whole plate of mini meat pies.

Harry took one. “Nothing. Theo’s drunk.”

Theo kept laughing, then coughed and made a gurgling sound.

“Yeah, no kidding,” said Ron. “Listen, mate, I’ve got a problem. You have to help me.”

“What is it?” Harry said, alarmed.

“Er, no,” Ron said. “No, no. It’s not anything bad. It’s — okay, I’m just going to say it. I want to ask Hermione to dance. Do you think I should?”

Theo laughed harder.

“Um,” Harry said. “You just said you wanted to, so yeah. I think you should.”

“No but, it’s just. It’s _Hermione_. Mate, you’ve met her.”

“I’ve definitely done that, yes.”

“She’s going to say no.”

“You haven’t even asked her.”

“I just know she will.”

“It’s Hermione,” Harry said. “She likes you.”

“Does she?!” Ron said wildly.

“Morgana’s mercy,” said Theo. “Ask her, or I will.”

As luck would have it, at that moment Hermione turned up, face pink from exertion. “Woo,” she said. “I’m knackered.”

“Who were you dancing with?” Harry asked, so Ron didn’t have to.

“Padma,” she said, gesturing over her shoulder. Padma’s robes had a strip of sparkling fabric that flashed with her every movement. She was leaning against a different table, chatting animatedly with Pansy. As Harry watched, the two of them laughed. “She’s so good. Ow, my legs.”

“Padma,” said Ron darkly.

Harry nudged him.

Ron made a noise that could not, in any way, be interpreted as human speech.

“Hermione,” Theo said, still sitting on the ground. “Dance with me?”

Hermione leaned down to him. “Theodore, hi. Oh god, you’re really drunk. Can you even stand?”

“Don’t think so.”

“Hermione,” Ron said determinedly.

“Yes?”

“Can you — will you — dance. With me?”

Hermione looked rather amused. She was definitely enjoying herself. She said, “I need to rest. But yes, all right. When the last song comes on.”

“Last song?” Harry said.

“Well, not the _last_ song.” Hermione cast _Tempus_. “Just the last song for the year. Should be soon.” Then she said, “I saw Draco, near the entrance. He was looking for you.”

Harry put down his glass.

***

Draco wasn’t at the entrance. He was in an alcove by the windows, arguing with a group of people Harry didn’t recognise.

“No no no,” a woman with glasses and a nose piercing was saying vehemently. “They have lift. Lift, you see. From the spinning blades. And they’ve got these rotors on the top and the back. That’s how it works. It’s science.”

“The shape isn’t aerodynamic at all,” Draco said. He spotted Harry. “Potter!” Harry went over to his side. Draco smiled winsomely at him. “Potter, tell these Muggles, please, that a helick — helicopter is a big murderous machine of danger, and shouldn’t be allowed in the skies.”

“I see you’ve also found the illicit firewhisky that’s mysteriously popping up all over the place,” Harry said dryly.

“Don’t call it firewhisky,” Draco scolded. “It’s butterbeer. We’ve all agreed that it’s butterbeer.” He nodded at the group. “Everyone, meet Potter. You know who he is. Potter, meet everyone.”

“Helicopters are big murderous machines of danger,” Harry said, to make him happy.

“There,” Draco pronounced triumphantly. “See?”

“They’re really not,” said a boy who resembled the woman enough that he was probably her brother.

“To think,” said Draco loudly, “that we banned flying carpets while Muggles were putting boxes with rotating knives in the sky.”

“Oh my god,” said the woman. She turned to Harry. “Is he always like this?”

“A carpet isn’t exactly aerodynamic either,” the boy pointed out.

“Yes, okay, but when was the last time a carpet chopped someone’s arm off?”

“He’s only sometimes like this,” Harry told the woman.

“What was your name again?” said another man in the group to Draco. “Draco? As in dragon? You’re goddamn hilarious. Carpets, Jesus.”

“Consider, if you will, all the other things flying in the sky,” Draco said passionately. “Birds, for instance. Small children. It’s not safe.”

“Small children,” said the woman.

“Precisely. I speak from personal experience.”

Harry tugged on Draco’s arm. “Draco.”

“What, Potter?”

“Dance with me.”

“You can’t dance.” Draco said it again to the woman: “He can’t dance.”

“Dance with me anyway. It’s the last song.”

Draco let Harry drag him away. “It’s not safe!” he cried to the Muggles as he left.

It was a slow song. Soft guitar strings and softer lyrics.

Harry’s plan had been something like, step one: get Draco onto the dance floor. He hadn’t, unfortunately, thought as far as a step two.

Draco seemed to realise this. His mouth twitched. “Potter,” he said, and burst into laughter. He laughed and laughed, and as he did so he positioned their hands, turned their bodies, started moving.

And they were dancing.

“You remember?” Draco said, still full of mirth. “One, two, three, Harry.”

They weren’t actually waltzing. Harry said, “I remember. One, two, three.”

“There. I’m going to spin you.”

Harry let himself be spun.

Draco slowly stopped laughing, though he kept smiling. He put their foreheads together, and somewhere between the steps, and the swaying, and the song, the smile turned from teasing to wistful.

Draco murmured, “We can’t keep going on like this, can we?”

We can, Harry wanted to say. We can. I can. I’ll have whatever you can give.

He said, “No, we can’t.”

“I told you ages ago that I’d sort myself out,” Draco said. “You know I’m a liar. But this time it’s true. Next year, Harry, I’m going to do it. Really do it.”

The music was drawing to an end. People were slowing to a stop, raising their wands and starting the countdown.

“Next year,” Draco repeated. “Come on.”

And he lead Harry out of the Hall.

***

“What are we doing?” Harry asked, as they picked up speed and ran.

“Keep up,” Draco replied, which explained nothing.

They arrived, panting, back in Harry’s room, where the candles were still burning.

“Next year,” Draco said again, shutting the door. “Which means this year, this year —“ He crowded Harry back and back, against the four-poster bed, and pushed him onto it, tugged off his boots. “This year I can still do this. Can’t I?”

He was asking. It was undoubtedly already the new year. But Draco was asking.

“Yes,” Harry said, and kissed him.

“Harry,” Draco said into his mouth. “Harry, Harry.”

Harry wriggled further back on the bed. Draco crawled into the space between Harry’s legs. He was pulling at his robe belt and making the tangle worse. Harry stilled his hands and spread them out: his long fingers, dry from the winter; his oval nails that had been trimmed flat; his scholar’s wrists. Harry wanted to kiss them, and did, bringing both hands to his face, leaving them there against his cheeks.

“Let me,” he said.

He stripped Draco to the waist; bare, Draco flushed under his gaze and looked away, but looked back almost at once, defiant, then beseeching.

Then he said, “Fuck, it’s really cold.”

Harry laughed at him, laughed at them both. He cast a Warming Charm, and ran his palm from chest to ribs to hip, from shoulder to shoulder. Draco shivered the whole way.

“You have goosebumps,” Harry said.

“Because it’s _cold_.”

“Liar.”

He kissed Draco’s neck and bore him down, so that their positions switched. Draco’s hair, loose now, fanned across the pillow.

Harry, still fully clothed, pulled off Draco’s robes the rest of the way.

Draco gasped. He said, “Do you know the spell…?”

“I do.” Harry took off his glasses and leaned down and sort of — nuzzled at Draco’s throat. God, Draco was here, letting him. Draco had said, this year. Harry felt his heart constrict, and for the next few minutes could not do anything else but kiss Draco without pause.

When he drew back Draco’s lips were in the same state as they had been that morning at the observatory, kiss-red and unbearably wanton.

Draco said, making a good attempt at composure and not quite managing, “Do you have any plans to get undressed, or will I have to use my imagination?”

“You’re such a prat,” Harry said affectionately, pulling apart his collar. Draco’s hands had found his waist, but were failing utterly to do anything helpful whatsoever. “Anyway, you know what my body looks like, so your imagination should be fairly accurate.”

“Not in this specific scenario, Potter.”

“We’re in bed, you’re naked, stop calling me Potter.”

“But I like calling you Potter,” Draco said. He slipped his hands into the parting of Harry’s robes. “Potter.” His thumb brushed a nipple. “Potter.” He was biting his lip to keep from laughing. “Potter.”

“You are,” Harry said, struggling out of his sleeves, “just, completely —“

“Yes?”

Harry threw off his robes, discarded his boxers. Draco’s expression changed. He reached up, quite deliberately, and caressed with his index finger the edge of Harry’s eyes, the kiss-muddled line of Harry’s lips. He looked very much like he was trying to commit everything to memory, and Harry couldn’t stand it. He couldn’t stand it at all.

It was harder to see without his glasses, but he couldn’t put them back on, because he needed to kiss Draco, to tongue inside his mouth and then press their faces together, so insistently that when they parted every place they had come together was marked by reddening skin.

He wanted to say something, anything, that would reassure them both, that would make this less terrifying, that would ease the tenderness that was threatening to take him under. But he couldn’t think of the words. He thought of Draco in all the ways that he knew him — cruel sometimes, kind others, annoying and sweet, talking too much and talking too little. He thought of Draco as he had found him once past midnight, still in the potions lab, head bent over a cauldron and so intent, so focused. He thought of how Draco was in the day, bossy and confident, compared to how he was in the night, painfully sincere, like he was giving Harry his heart each time, saying, this is yours.

And wasn’t it? It was, it was. It was Harry’s. He could prove it: with kisses and touches, with pleasure. If he licked here, if he stroked there, Draco’s back would arch, and Draco’s voice would moan, and Draco’s breath would quicken, and what did it mean, if not: here is my heart, keep it safe?

This year, he remembered.

“Harry,” Draco said, undone, so the name came out like a sigh. “Will you…?”

Harry took a wand from where he had dropped them, half lost among the bedsheets, not bothering to check whose wand it was, and cast the spell. Draco made a soft keening sound, eyelids fluttering shut. “Please,” he said.

“If it’s too much,” Harry said, trying to look at his own fingers but also not miss the expression on Draco’s face, “or if it hurts —“

“It doesn’t hurt.”

“Tell me what you like.”

“You,” Draco said, “I like you,” which was not something he would have said in any other circumstance, probably, because it was too trite and too insufficient to capture anything important, except that in this instance it did.

It was hot and wet, and, more than that, Harry was a little surprised to find, it was fun. Draco was hypersensitive, for obvious reasons, reacting to any small movement of Harry’s fingers with strings of disjointed words and plenty of noises that weren’t words at all. It was easy to tease him into incoherency. He was leaking all over his stomach, and Harry wanted to lick it all up, except he was afraid it would tip Draco over too soon.

He could have done this all night. Next time —

“What’s wrong?” Draco asked.

“Nothing,” Harry said, moving up to kiss him more, pressing their bodies together in the process.

Draco groaned into the kiss, pulled at Harry’s hair. He said, “If I don’t ask, will you draw this out as long as possible?”

“Ask,” Harry said, and wasn’t sure if it was an order or a question.

“Harry,” Draco whispered into his ear, and hesitated, warm breath steaming against Harry’s skin. “Harry. I’m asking.” And: “Please.”

Harry kissed his jaw. “Again.”

“Please.”

“Anything you want,” Harry replied, except of course right now there was just one thing Draco wanted. Harry moved to grant it to him.

It felt more overwhelming than he was prepared for. Buried, their eyes met, and Harry was almost done then and there. Draco saw it, must have felt it, and he half smirked, but it looked more loving than anything, and his hands on Harry’s body were so achingly gentle. God, Harry thought. It was absolutely unfair, how they had tangled heartstring with heartstring so that it hurt to pull apart, and now they had to learn this new sensation together, and might only learn it this once.

It was certainly not cold anymore; the Warming Charm might have been too much at this point. Both of them were sweating, and every bit of Draco’s skin Harry kissed and licked and sucked tasted like salt. He couldn’t get enough of it.

He tried to hold it back. Three times he tried, and the last time was too much. Draco, legs wrapped around him, pushed him in closer and kissed him through it, and held him as he descended, stroking his spine, stroking his hair, murmuring things Harry couldn’t quite hear.

He couldn’t say how long it lasted. The pleasure was so complete and so whole he was loathe to measure it. Eventually, though, he became aware that Draco was watching him. He wasn’t even touching himself.

Harry shifted, smeared his fingers with the mess on Draco’s belly, and wrapped his hand around him. Draco’s lips parted slightly. He didn’t look away from Harry’s face.

He stayed like that the whole time: watching, letting Harry watch. Some of his hair was stuck to his cheek from the sweat, and when he came a few of the strands dipped into his mouth.

After, when Harry was cleaning them up, he brushed the strands away. Draco smirked at him as he did so. It was a real proper smirk. Harry kissed it.

Languidly, they fit themselves together. Draco put his ear against Harry’s heart, as he was wont to, now. He traced patterns on Harry’s skin; Harry felt them: a spiral, a square, an angular line, folding in.

Draco murmured, “I didn’t mean to do this. I didn’t plan this. I was going to let you go to dinner alone.”

Harry held him tighter. “Are you going to disappear on me in the morning?”

“Do you prefer that I wake you up before I leave?”

“Yes.”

“I’m not going to go very far. There are a lot of unoccupied rooms.”

“How will you sleep?”

“Not very well, I’d imagine. We’re still going to see each other throughout the day.”

“But it’s going to be different.”

“I have to do it,” Draco said.

“Sort yourself out.”

“That’s right.”

“I don’t actually know,” Harry said carefully, “what that really means.”

Draco was silent. Then he said, “Did you know, when I’m lying on you like this, when you speak, the words reverberate? Right through my skull.” He turned slightly, pressing a kiss onto Harry’s sternum. “Harry. It means that I’m going to be honest. I’m going to find a way to be honest, because this is a thing worth being honest about.”

“How long will it take?”

“I’m a liar and I have been a liar all my life, so a while, probably.”

He sounded quite miserable, which made Harry want to kiss him on the lips again, but Draco’s weight was comfortable and settled, and Harry was too lethargic to move.

So he only said, “Don’t leave without waking me up.”


	35. Chapter 35

**WITCH WEEKLY**  
Iss. January 19th, 1998

_Harry Potter: Death, Life & Love_

Saved by his mother on that infamous October night in 1981, Harry Potter was given to Muggle relatives to raise from a young age, and grew up entirely unaware of his grand destiny, or, indeed, his magical roots.

“I don’t believe in destiny,” he told me as we settled onto identical conjured chairs in the Astronomy Tower of Hogwarts castle.

This was a strange thing to say, given that there had been a true prophecy, the contents of which are still classified Ministry secrets, but which Potter has, according to an official memo issued by the recovering Department of Mysteries, fulfilled.

When pressed, Potter elaborated: “There was a prophecy, yes, but it could have gone either way. There was no guarantee, and anyway — I’ve seen the Hall of Prophecy. It’s full to the brim with stuff that never came true.”

Potter is a young man who many say resemble his late father, James. Physically, this is undeniable. He is tall but not too tall, bespectacled and wild haired, covertly handsome in a way that tempts you to look twice. However, this reporter is just old enough to remember James Potter, and I am confident in saying that the son is not the father. Where James was boisterous and unrestrained, difficult to convince into serious conversation, Harry — at least during this interview — was contemplative and reserved, with the rare flash of fire.

For someone who has been famous all his life, dominating wizarding press for years on end, and deservedly so, he was not what I expected. I wondered aloud if this were a consequence of his death and revival.

“I’m not sure what you mean,” he said in reponse, “but dying didn’t really teach me anything. Or, well. It —“ and here he paused for several seconds, flexing his hands on his lap — “it taught me _some_ things, I guess. Mainly that I didn’t want to be dead. But I knew that already.” His tone turned self-deprecating. “Actually, it’s life that teaches you things, isn’t it? Sorry, that’s obvious. I don’t really know how to do this. I don’t have anything profound to say.”

Prior to this year, Harry Potter has only ever granted one exclusive interview, and that was to the _Daily Prophet_ in early 1996. That article, widely circulated and reprinted, contained many profound statements from Potter on the importance of facing the truth and banding together to fight a common enemy.

“Those were different circumstances,” Potter recalled. Did he want to speak on it further? He didn’t. I asked him instead about Draco Malfoy, who gave his own interview in the same article, and waited to see what Potter would say.

“He’s a close friend of mine. At the time of that interview, he was …” Potter trailed off, despite my encouragement to finish the thought. He pivoted: “Draco Malfoy, along with several others, was absolutely crucial in what you people are calling ‘my’ victory over [He Who Must Not Be Named]. Without him, I would not be speaking with you today.”

Malfoy, it cannot be denied, featured prominently in the deluge of reporting following You-Know-Who’s defeat and Potter’s death. This was inevitable, as Malfoy had placed himself in the limelight by refusing to cooperate with authorities who were acting, as they sincerely believed, in the best interests of Potter himself. In the course of guarding Potter’s body from a proper burial, Malfoy injured several licensed healers and caused damage to Hogwarts property. In light of this, it should be understandable that many articles were unflattering in their account of his actions.

Of course, in a shocking turn of events with which we are now all familiar, Malfoy’s insistence that Potter was not completely dead was correct. Potter, for his part, was entirely unapologetic. “Draco saved me,” he proclaimed, more than once.

Per an official announcement from Headmistress McGonagall and the leadership of Hogwarts One Hundred earlier this year, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is set to reopen for classes in February, for what is sure to be a hectic term on an unconventional schedule, as professors rearrange curricula and students sign up for supplementary classes to make up for the disruption caused by the war. Despite this, there was a palpable sense of celebration in the air during my visit, with all the implications thereof. Surrounded by so many happy couples, was Potter considering finding love himself?

To this Potter smiled, but it was a smile directed at someone not in the room. It wasn’t meant for me. “No comment,” he said.

Rumours regarding Potter’s love life make mention of Pansy Parkinson, a fellow Slytherin (who had a hand in arranging this very interview); Hermione Granger, the Muggleborn founder of Hogwarts One Hundred and current Hogwarts Head Girl; and, of course — scandalously — Draco Malfoy, the sole heir of the Malfoy legacy. But it seems that those readers hoping for either a confirmation or denial of Potter’s availability in the world of romance will, sadly, be left wondering for the time being.

(Continued on page 12 after photos.)

***

**THE QUIBBLER**  
No. 28988 Friday, February 13th 1998

_HARRY POTTER AND THE RISE OF DANGLING DEMMOQUAGS_

Boy wonder Harry Potter, student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, notorious survivor of not one but two Killing Curses, has touched the entire wizarding world with his humble tale of self-sacrifice and heroism. We have all shed a tear for his bravery, and parents around the country and perhaps worldwide will, no doubt, assign Potter’s deeds to the realm of bedtime stories, in the hopes of instilling essential core values of goodness and humility in their own children.

BUT SHOULD THEY?

New evidence suggests that Potter may not be all that he seems. A source close to Potter who wished to remain anonymous revealed that the former Chosen One is frequently distracted during conversations with his peers. Now, the average reader may posit that difficulty in concentrating on the task at hand may be due to a number of benign causes, such as lack of sleep, but the astute reader will be well aware that this is a primary symptom of possession by Dangling Demmoquags.

We reached out to Velma Vendanga, professional quagmaster, to give her expert opinion: “Dangling Demmoquags thrive on attention, and once they find a host with plenty of it, it is almost impossible to expel them. They will ensure that the host is unable to think on one topic for long, while remaining virtually undetectable.” She adds, “Potter’s case is especially interesting, as he was allegedly dead for such a long period of time. I have never known Demmoquags to inhabit a corpse.” There has been much speculation as to how Potter survived being dead for so long. Some have even suggested the use of dark magic, but Vendanga is confident that the hidden key may lie in hitherto undiscovered Demmoquag powers. “If only Potter would consent to a consultation.”

Secondary symptoms of possession by Dangling Demmoquags include vanishing legs, so potential suitors on this upcoming Valentine’s Day may wish to keep an eye on Potter’s appendages.

***

**DAILY PROPHET**  
Tuesday, March 24th 1998

_BOY WHO LIVED CHARGED AND PARDONED_

Harry Potter appeared before the restored Wizengamot at 0700 hours this Tuesday morning in attendance of a hearing concerning his actions during the war. Potter performed the Killing Curse on the night of October 19th last year in front of over seventy witnesses, killing He Who Must Not Be Named. The application of Unforgivable Curses on fellow humanoids by a witch or wizard is strictly prohibited under the Bard Act of 1717, and though use of them was granted to Aurors during the first wizarding war, no such mandate was issued for the second. The minimum sentencing for casting a successful Killing Curse is life in Azkaban. Potter, however, was immediately issued a pardon.

Elphias Doge, Special Advisor to the Wizengamot, provided an official statement: “It was necessary for the integrity of the law that Potter be charged, but further still it was necessary for our sense of justice that he be pardoned under acknowledgement of highly special circumstances.”

At the end of the short hearing, Potter took to the podium and thanked the Elders for their time.

Potter’s appearance in front of the Wizengamot comes at a crucial point, as the Ministry is under heavy pressure from Hogwarts One Hundred advocates to commit to a reform on conditions experienced by prisoners in Azkaban. When questioned on this matter, Potter declined to comment, referring reporters to his friend and associate, Hermione Granger, who is the lead voice for the ongoing campaign.

Potter is expected to attend an official Ministry ceremony in April where he will be awarded an Order of Merlin, First Class, for his pivotal role in the war.

***

Harry was dying for a glass of water. Or, well, not _dying_, of course, but still rather desperate for one. The worst part was that the sun beating down on his face wasn’t even real. Whoever had been responsible for decorating the ceremonial hall had been far too enthusiastic about the phrase ‘warm spring morning.’ It just wasn’t proper, especially seeing as how they were actually underground in the middle of London.

He plucked at his robe collar, which was too high, and resisted the urge to fidget, or get out his wand to cool himself down. The Acting Minister for Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt, was currently giving a speech, which meant that all media attention was, for the moment, rightfully trained on the stage. Harry wanted to keep it that way. He wondered if he could get away with taking the Order of Merlin off his neck and slipping it into a pocket. The gold of the medal kept flashing in the light.

He wondered also if he should have taken up George Weasley’s offer to Polyjuice into him as a body double.

Hermione, sitting next to him, seemed entirely unbothered by her own medal. She’d been awarded an Order of Merlin, Second Class, in recognition of her signficant achievements in bringing the community together in a time of peril and organising the defence of Hogwarts, amongst other things. She was humming a little, and obviously enjoying herself immensely.

She enjoyed herself even more during the post-ceremony meet-and-greet. It was bewildering how she seemed to know over two-thirds of the room already. Resigned, he let her steer him here and there and shook hands obligingly. At least every handshake brought him closer to the end, he thought to himself unconvincingly.

“And this is Adrian Quellwater,” she said, “new deputy head of the Department of International Magical Cooperation. He’s been our main contact over the past several months for things like cleanup with the French and replotting formerly Unplottable foreign safehouses.”

“The honour is mine, Mr Potter,” said Quellwater, pumping Harry’s hand. “Absolutely chuffed to meet you.”

“It’s nice to meet you, too,” Harry said politely.

“I have a daughter, ten years old, almost Hogwarts age,” said Quellwater — and oh no, here it was, Harry braced himself — “and she’s a huge fan of yours. She’s clipped out a few of those photos from that _Witch Weekly_ interview you did, and I was wondering if you would be so kind as to sign them?” He pulled out a Self-Inking Quill from seemingly nowhere, and an entire envelope full of photos that were most certainly not all clippings from one magazine.

“Sure,” Harry said, and hoped that his inner agony wasn’t too obvious in the tone of his voice. “Why not.”

“That went well,” Hermione said, once Quellwater had been handed back a grand total of thirty-two signed photographs and shaken Harry’s hand again.

Harry gave her a look. He couldn’t tell if she was being sarcastic or if she was trying to send him positive vibes. He had no use for positive vibes at present. The only thing he had a use for was the exit.

He turned to see if perhaps the large double doors nestled between the fake oak trees were any closer than they had been the last time he’d checked, and collided with someone.

“I beg your pardon,” said Draco’s voice.

Naturally, Draco had been invited to the ceremony as well. He hadn’t received an Order of Merlin, which was outrageous, but he’d been included in a group commendation. He’d been seated in a different area to Harry, who had been in the very centre of the front row.

“Malfoy,” Harry said, because Draco was looking at him warily. “Sorry, didn’t see you.” This was a lie, because he was always, always, searching for Draco’s presence; he’d just lost sight of him temporarily thanks to Quellwater’s thirty-two autographs. “Are you making your way out? Shall we go together?”

“I … No, best not.” Draco inclined his head at Hermione. “Granger. Congratulations.”

“Draco,” she said, smiling. “Thank you.”

Draco’s eyes flickered back and forth between them. He said, “Potter. I’ll see you back at school.”

“All right,” Harry said, and let him go without touching him.

Hermione’s smile dropped into a frown. “Are you going to explain that?”

“Explain what?” Harry hedged.

“The two of you _did_ have a fight, didn’t you?”

“I already told you that we didn’t.”

“Then why are you acting like that? Avoiding each other?”

“We’re not really _avoiding_ each other …”

“Compared to what you were like before, you’re definitely avoiding each other.”

“Look, it’s fine, okay? We’re in a bunch of the same classes. I see him every single day, pretty much.”

“Harry,” Hermione said firmly, and dragged him behind a tree trunk. “I know that I’ve been extremely busy, between cramming for NEWTs and all this political work, but I still want to know things about you. I want to help you, if you need help. I will listen to you, if you need to talk. Will you please tell me what is going on?”

“It’s nothing,” Harry said quickly. “It’s — um. Draco. He needs time.”

“Time for what?”

Harry said in a small voice, “It’s, er, none of your business?”

Hermione put her hands on her hips. “I consider the both of you to be my friends — yes, even Draco. We sit together in Advanced Arithmancy these days with Padma, and he’s been awfully well mannered. So actually, it is my business.”

“If you sit with him in Advanced Arithmancy,” Harry countered, “why don’t you ask him what’s going on?”

A spark came into Hermione’s eyes. “I could do that.”

“Wait — no,” Harry backtracked frantically, mind filled with horrible visions of Hermione interrogating Draco on his behalf. “Look, Hermione. He’s trying to sort himself out. Leave him alone.”

“What do you mean, sort himself out? Is he _still_…?”

This was precisely why he’d been avoiding this very topic whenever he’d been around Hermione for the past few months. She’d backed him into a corner. A corner covered in bark.

“I mean —“

“Does Pansy know?”

Harry hesitated.

“She doesn’t know,” Hermione surmised.

He really didn’t like where this was going.

“I see,” Hermione said, nodding slowly. “I see how it is.”

***

As Hermione had predicted, NEWTs and OWLs had been pushed back to the summer, all the way to August. At least, this was the case for most seventh and fifth-year students who had attended classes during the period when Hogwarts had been functioning as a small village for various refugees. Others — those who had gone into hiding or moved abroad and therefore not been present — had no choice but to delay for another year entirely.

Exactly two students had been given special allowance to take their NEWTs ‘when they were ready,’ provided that they elected a time before the end of the year. Harry was one of them, and while he wasn’t sure how it was supposed to work or be entirely fair, he wasn’t so noble as to refuse the offer.

Unfortunately, this didn’t actually mean that he had an easier time of it. He was still being afforded roughly the same amount of preparation as any student would have had during a normal NEWT year, and the normal NEWT year was a relentless one.

Draco was the other student.

Due to the way each curriculum was structured, the two of them had to take supplementary lessons to fill in the gaps in cases where the normal classes were running too far ahead.

In other words, they did, in point of fact, see each other almost every single day, frequently in settings where no one else was in the room (the professors, all overworked, tended to only give a rundown of each topic before leaving, only checking in once or twice, and sometimes not at all).

Each time, Draco was strictly business. At least, he tried to be.

He would say things like: “I think it would be best if we got ten minutes each for every separate transfiguration attempt. Do you agree? Would you like to go first?”

Or: “Will you listen to me recite this runic configuration, and check it against the Advanced Syllabary, please?”

Harry felt bad for thinking it, but it was sort of entertaining to watch. Sometimes, he’d lean his head on his hand and do exactly that: stare, while Draco was being, as Hermione had put it, ‘awfully well mannered.’

Just, it was Draco. It still felt like they were sharing an intimacy. He could tell Draco felt the same, and he could also tell it was driving Draco a little to despair. How wretched it was for him, that they knew each other so well.

It was the worst (the best) when Harry did something stupid, and Draco would, for just a moment, forget himself and say: “Potter, what — you’re supposed to be turning me into an armadillo. Do you know what an armadillo looks like? Have you looked at your textbook? There’s an illustration. Look at the drawing, Potter. It’s coloured and everything. I can’t believe this.”

Or: “When the instructions say ‘grind to fine powder,’ they don’t mean ‘and it’s okay to leave a couple of large lumps just because.’ Hello? Are you paying attention?”

“I’m paying attention,” Harry said to this latest query.

Draco turned away, a bit pink in the face. He mumbled, “No, you’re not.”

Seeing a slither of an opening, Harry asked, “How are you, Draco?”

“I’m _fine_,” Draco said cuttingly, then added, putting the polite mask back on: “And yourself?”

“I miss you,” Harry told him softly, earnestly, and only regretted saying it a little, mostly because Draco stopped talking to him for the rest of the lesson.

Generally, he was too stressed from studying to think too much. It was only when he tried to go to sleep and found the bed to be too big that it all caught up with him, and he had to either resign himself to tossing and turning in and out of ceaseless nightmares, or give up and study some more. Once or twice, he managed to obtain sleeping potions from owl-order apothecaries, and he tried to save those for when it was really bad. It would have been nice to have a steady supply, but he was cautious about ordering too much from the same source. It wouldn’t take much digging for a bored, curious proprietor to find out that their client was Harry Potter, and then he’d be dealing with another round of overblown tabloid headlines (not that they’d ever really let up).

One night, when it was still quite early, he’d had the brilliant idea of sneaking out for some exercise. His Firebolt was ruined, but he could steal a school broom and go flying through the Forbidden Forest and some of the surrounding mountainside — that would tire him out enough to sleep, surely?

It went better than he could have hoped. The clean air, the sound of animals, the utter silence when he went as high as he could and the wind stopped for a second — it was a balm. When he’d formally given up the Quidditch Captaincy (it would have been inappropriate for him to take back the position when they’d passed it on to Daphne after he’d died, and anyway she’d been captaining the team in an unofficial capacity since last September), he should have immediately etched out a plan to keep flying on the regular.

He started doing it at least twice a week: sneak out in the Cloak, steal a broom, fly at breakneck speed (or what passed for breakneck speed on a Cleansweep Seven) for a couple of hours. It worked better than a potion, and he rarely dreamed.

By mid-May, it was so routine that he barely paid attention when he was sneaking in and out, which was how he got caught by Narcissa Malfoy.

He came out of the broom cupboard after resting the Cleansweep back on its hooks and there she was, standing in the moonlight, looking straight at him because he’d gotten lazy and stopped wearing the Cloak unless it was strictly necessary.

He swore involuntarily, because she’d scared the crap out of him, and then hastily apologised. What on earth was she doing out on the Quidditch pitch at two in the morning? He really wanted to ask. He didn’t.

Narcissa raised her wand. Words came out of it in a flowing script: _Hello, Harry. Will you come with me?_

“Er,” he said. “Okay.”

They walked silently back to the castle. Eventually, he realised that she was taking him to McGonagall’s office. Fantastic. He was of age, he’d killed Voldemort, and now he was being taken to the Headmistress to be told off for staying up past curfew like he was eleven and trying to smuggle a baby dragon out of the country. Just fantastic.

Except that wasn’t what happened. When they entered the office McGonagall looked up from her desk and said, “Ah, Narcissa. Back so soon? No, never mind, I see. You’ve found Mr Potter. Well, I haven’t put it back yet, so you can make use of it right away. Mind you, I’ll be retiring to bed soon, so if I’m not here when you’re done, please do let yourself out.”

‘It’ turned out to be the Pensieve. Mystified, Harry nodded at Narcissa when she gestured at it, and followed her into the memory.

He landed in the sun room in Malfoy Manor, back as it had been in its glory. A different version of Narcissa, throat whole and unmarred, was reclined on one of the couches, leafing idly through a book.

The present Narcissa took a seat at the tea table and said, “Thank you for coming with me, Harry. It’s much easier to talk in here. Pay no mind to the past me: she doesn’t do anything except read for the next three hours. Please have a seat.”

Sitting in a memory was an interesting experience, as he could not actually move the chairs. Luckily, they were placed a generous distance from the table.

Narcissa smiled at him. It was her society smile, the one she employed all the time, a tool in a well-stocked arsenal. It had a rather different effect now that her throat was what it was.

“May I ask what you were doing out on the Quidditch pitch at this hour?”

“I went flying,” he said.

She nodded, as if this made perfect sense, and he realised she’d asked just for the sake of asking. He remembered Astoria, a long time ago, telling him that conversations needed foundations.

She’d asked, so he could, too. “What about you?”

“I was taking a walk,” Narcissa replied. If they’d had tea she would have sipped it.

Harry frowned. “You’re staying at Grimmauld Place, aren’t you? Because that’s what I was told, and I agreed.”

“I am staying at Grimmauld Place, Harry. I’m merely visiting Hogwarts. I came to speak with Draco through the very method we are using now. After we finished, there was much on my mind, so I went for a walk.”

“Oh.” The memory was from spring, the sun at enough of an angle that the shadows drifted, and the light pressed generously through green leaves to land in golden ovals, smudged across the dark wooden floor. “Is Draco all right?”

Instead of answering, Narcissa said, “It is a beautiful place, isn’t it? It was always my favourite. Lucius yielded it to me; he hardly ever came in here.”

“Draco liked to spend time with you here.”

“Yes.” Briefly, her smile turned genuine. “It was our space, I should say.”

“And is there a reason you’ve brought me here?”

An eyebrow lowered, subtly. “As ever, you have no finesse, nor appreciation for the dance of dialogue.”

“I’m bad at dancing.”

“I do realise now that I should have spoken with you more all those times you stayed with us,” Narcissa said. “But, you see, I find it quite impossible to be interested in children. With the exception of my own son, obviously.”

“I didn’t mind,” Harry said truthfully. “You were much better compared to what I was used to.”

A distasteful expression flickered over Narcissa’s face. “Those Muggles you lived with.”

“Yeah.”

“Horrid creatures.”

“They’re human, but yeah.”

“Draco tells me,” Narcissa drawled, as if it didn’t bother her at all, “that he has made some Muggle friends.”

“He has?” Harry said, confused, then remembered. “Oh. Huh. Those guys. I didn’t realise he was keeping in contact with them.”

“A penpal,” Narcissa elaborated.

“A penpal,” Harry said, and resisted the urge to ask if she knew whether or not they were just trading missives back and forth about helicopters.

“These days, he is eager to talk about anything, as long as it’s not about you. It was quite the opposite in the past.” Narcissa’s voice turned cold: “I will ask once, so answer me true — have you hurt him?”

“No,” Harry said instantly. “No. At least, not in the way that you mean.”

“And in the way I don’t mean?”

“I —“ Harry took a deep breath. “I don’t know how to explain it to you.”

“Try.”

Harry looked at her, eyes narrowing, and said, “Do you actually — do you know what Draco means to me?”

Narcissa’s face went blank. It probably meant he’d finally said something that she hadn’t been prepared for. She said, “I might have some idea.”

“Really?” he challenged. “Because — with Draco, if I could — if I could —“

“If you could?” Narcissa prompted, when he didn’t continue.

It was too much to reveal. He didn’t want to do it. It came spilling out anyway. “If I could, I — I want him all to myself, all the time. But if I can’t get that, which obviously I can’t, I would — oh, I would speak to him for ten minutes. Five. If he’s walking somewhere I want to walk with him. If he’s sitting down, I want the seat beside him. When he’s talking endlessly about alchemy, or anything else, I want to be quiet and listen. When he doesn’t want to talk, I’ll listen to his silence. It makes me — god, it makes me stupidly happy, to just sit within his words or his silence. I could do it forever.” Harry could feel himself blushing, which angered him, because everything he’d said was true, and he didn’t want to make it seem trivial, didn’t want to make it seem like he was embarrassed. Even though he was, saying all of this to Draco’s mother.

“You mean that you love him,” Narcissa concluded, after a dreadfully long pause.

“If you want to squeeze it all into one word,” Harry said. “Yes.”

“I did suspect that you loved him,” she said, and sounded strangely satisfied.

There was no point in doing this halfway. “And did you know that he loves me back?”

Her mouth curled. “Has he told you so?”

“He doesn’t need to tell me so. It’s in everything he does.”

Narcissa gave a small sigh.

“That’s why he’s hurt,” Harry explained.

She turned to stare out at the garden. “I said, earlier, that he’ll talk now about anything as long as it’s not you.” In the memory, a robin alighted on the branch of a tree right by the window glass, grooming itself. Both Narcissas watched it intently. “More accurately, he talks around you. His conversation avoids your mention so carefully the lack forms its own shape. Tonight, he wanted to speak to me about duty.” She sighed again. “My Aunt Walburga, you understand, was the matriarch of the Black line. We all learnt the old truths at her knee.”

A flash of recollection: Draco, at Ursa-at-Sea, talking to Walburga’s portrait. He’d done that a lot.

“I wonder,” said Narcissa measuredly, “if you think me uncaring?”

“I think you have a very specific set of values,” Harry said cautiously. He glanced at her throat, where the skin was jagged and raw.

“There is nothing I value more than my son, and my son’s happiness.”

“He’s scared of losing you.”

Narcissa’s mouth opened, closed again to a line that was almost uncertain. He’d surprised her again. “That is not possible.”

“He thinks it is. He thinks you’ll love him less.”

“It isn’t. I wouldn’t.”

“Even if, even if he — would you let him?”

“Harry. Shall I be as frank as you prefer? Lucius is dead. My Aunt Walburga is dead.” Another robin landed to join the first. “The only person who won’t let Draco do as he desires is himself.”


	36. Chapter 36

“This isn’t right, is it?” said Ron. “No, it’s definitely not.”

“Try moving your arm more,” Harry suggested.

“Yeah but if I do that —“ Ron demonstrated — “it takes ages, and there’s a huge telegraph. What’s the point of a persistent invisible shield if everyone knows you’ve got one? Show me again.”

Harry cast the advanced Shield Charm.

“See that,” Ron said, pointing. “You’re barely moving.”

“I know,” Harry admitted, “but if you try it with the more pronounced movement, you’ll get the hang of it faster.”

Ron made another attempt; the shield manifested for a split second before fizzling out. “Bah.” He Summoned over a cushion from the Room’s far wall and sat down. “Everyone keeps assuming I’ll manage an O because I fought in the war. I’ll be lucky to get an A.”

“Do you need an O?” Harry sat down as well. “Were you going to apply for Auror training?”

“Thought about it. I dunno. What about you?”

“God, no.”

“You could totally do it though.”

Harry grimaced.

“Eh, well,” said Ron. “You’ll be fine either way, you rich bastard.”

“Ron, If you ever need —“

“No,” Ron interrupted hurriedly. “Aren’t you already pledging to that recovery fund we’re all getting a cut of?” His ears were red. “Don’t make me feel worse.”

The Room was almost as large as the Great Hall. It had to be, to provide enough space for the mix of students practising all manner of spells down its length. Several of them were even dueling. Since Snape’s death, McGonagall had struggled to find an adequate replacement to teach Defence on such short notice, so they had all been getting along with tutors sent along by the Ministry, who all tended to be Aurors with no teaching experience who did not communicate with each other about what had already been covered and what had not. The classes had been disorganised and confusing as a result, and Harry had somehow found himself semi-leading weekly unofficial catch-up lessons.

He said to Ron, “Sorry.”

Ron slapped him on the back. “Don’t apologise, either.”

“I do want you to know that if you ever need help of any kind, you can ask me.”

“Yeah,” Ron said easily. “I know, mate.”

“So no Auror training,” Harry said, moving back into simpler territory. “What else, then?”

“I talked to Bill a lot over the winter. Cursebreaking sounds like fun, if you can get along with goblins. But y’know, Bill was saying to me — he said there’s actually a whole bunch of different jobs out there no one ever tells you about. Said he met a bloke from Brazil who goes diving near ocean trenches to collect rare potions ingredients.”

“Sounds like that needs a particular skillset.”

“It’s just an example.” Ron looked uncharacteristically pensive. “‘Mione says she’s thinking of furthering her education.”

“What, really?” Harry hadn’t heard of this. “Like university?” There weren’t many wizarding universities.

“She said she’d considered that one, er, what’s it called. The one with the moon, something, something, Bloody impossible to pronounce the name. Anyway, the one in East Asia, the super exclusive one. But then there’s also that French-run thing on the continent. More of a mentor-apprentice system. Self-driven, she called it. It’ll be a lot closer.”

“But what about —“ Harry made an expansive gesture — “all the political stuff she’s doing here?”

“That’s what I said! She means to do it all at once, apparently.” Ron shook his head. “Nuts, if you ask me.”

“Typical Hermione.”

“Yeah, I guess. I wish she’d —“ Ron scrubbed at the back of his neck — “she’d just let me know. If we’re — y’know. Or if she’d rather … it’s bloody hard, not knowing.”

“Oh,” Harry said blankly. “I thought you were, er. Together?” He’d assumed that they were for months.

Ron’s ears were now so red he looked like he’d been hexed. “We are. At least I thought we were. It’s just that she’s so — so focused. She knows exactly what she wants and she has the drive to go get it. Y’know? I’m nothing like that.” He laughed humourlessly. “It’s funny; when I got her to dance with me at the New Year’s party, I remember thinking, ‘this is it.’ It was like, the war’s over and I’ve jumped over the last hurdle, so it should be easy now. Right? But mate, it’s not.”

Hermione was all the way over on the other side of the Room, conjuring elemental defences with Padma. She’d called forth a ring of fire, and Harry could tell it had been perfectly cast. Ron sighed.

Harry returned the slap on the back from earlier. “No,” he agreed. “It’s not. But that’s life.”

“_C’est la vie_,” muttered Ron grimly. “Bloody French.”

***

“Happy birthday,” Harry said to Draco.

“Thank you, Potter,” Draco replied levelly, and kept his nose in his Charms notes as though they were the most interesting things he’d ever read.

***

Ever since Harry had let slip to Hermione that something was going on that neither she nor Pansy knew about, he’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop.

When all that happened was the occasional pointed comment from Pansy during meals or in the Slytherin common room, and Hermione patting him meaningfully on the shoulder every time she saw him, he’d begun to relax.

There was probably a book in the Hogwarts library somewhere about the dangers of letting yourself fall into a false sense of security, but Harry, unfortunately, had not read it. Which was why, when the proverbial shoe did drop, it landed directly on his head.

It happened during dinner one Friday, which was usually the time when all fifth and seventh-year students were on their last legs and possibly falling asleep in the gravy, so he had some excuse, at least.

Pansy, sitting across from him, said very innocuously after dessert, “I can’t believe I’m still having trouble with counter-spells to body-controlling jinxes. I swear I should just drop Defence.”

“But you’ve kept up with it for so long,” said Daphne.

“I know,” Pansy said. “I don’t actually want to drop it. It’s just frustrating.”

“Is it the nonverbal component you’re having problems with?” Harry asked.

“Yes,” Pansy replied instantly.

“I went over it with Vincent last week, actually. If you’re having the same sort of issues as he did, I might be able to give you some tips.”

“That,” Pansy said, “would be fantastic. Do you have time now?”

“An hour, maybe.”

“Can we go to the Room?”

“Sure.”

She’d waved at Hermione as they’d walked out of the Hall.

If Pansy and Hermione were clear on one thing, it was that they were not friends. It was a huge relief to many Hogwarts students that they were not friends. Even Harry, who only followed the Hogwarts power struggle with tangential awareness, knew this. Hermione ruled Hogwarts One Hundred with an iron fist, yet, despite this, no decision was ever made without Pansy’s input. Pansy’s opposing voice was the only thing keeping Hermione from bulldozing over everyone else, and Hermione’s strict moral code was also the only thing keeping Pansy from unleashing a legion of spies into every House. If they ever became friends, the rest of Hogwarts faced certain doom. Or so said over-dramatic third-years loudly in the corridors between classes.

Actually, some other students said it too. Ginny, for instance.

Harry had told her, “So they’re both having fun being terrifying, whatever. It’s their final year, Ginny. Come on.”

“You’ll see,” Ginny had replied ominously.

“Uh huh.”

In other words: shoe, head, collision. Harry had seen the wave and dismissed it — signal or greeting, it had nothing to do with him — and allowed Pansy to bring him to the seventh floor corridor where the door to the Room had already, notably, manifested. She’d opened it and said, “Gentlemen first,” smiling, and he’d gone in with zero suspicion.

And then he’d realised, too late, that Pansy and Hermione did not need to be friends to work toward a common goal, a fact which they had demonstrated more than aptly during the war. They were already oustandingly successful accomplices when they wanted to be, friendship be damned.

In front of him was a thick curtain. Behind him, the door closed and disappeared.

“Pansy,” he said, “what —“

“We’ll let you two out first thing Monday morning,” she called from the other side, muffled.

“What?” He heard footsteps, receding. “Hey! Where are you going?”

“Don’t bother, Potter,” said Draco’s tired voice from the other side of the curtain.

“Malfoy?” Harry pushed past the curtain. “What the hell is going on?”

He emerged into a large rectangular room. Couches. A tea table. To his left was a modest fireplace. To his right were two doors, one set between frosted glass.

Directly opposite him was a bookshelf which stretched corner to corner and ascended, vanishing, toward a ceiling that he could not see. It might have been the wall itself. Draco was standing at its base, reading the spines.

“What’s going on,” he said, not looking at Harry, “is that Parkinson and Granger are drunk on power.”

“Pansy said she needed help with counter-spells,” Harry said, bemused.

“And Granger told me there was something important she wanted to discuss. She’s the one who requested this Room, I’d wager.”

Harry sat down. “Oh my god.”

Finally, Draco turned around. He said, “I don’t even have my textbooks.”

“You want to study,” Harry said, nonplussed.

“What else would I be doing if I’m going to be stuck in here all weekend, Potter?”

Harry nodded at the bookshelf. “What about those?”

“All useless,” Draco said unenthusiastically.

“All of them?”

In answer, Draco took three books off the shelf at random and levitated them to Harry. They were all heavy volumes bound with gold thread. The first title read, _Origin of Magic: Leyline to Leyline_; the second, _The Eternal Well: Hereditary Power and Blood Purity_; the third, _Bloodlines (Un)Broken_.

Every page in every book was blank.

“They’re all like this?” Harry asked.

“As far as I’ve been able to tell.” Draco sat down on the couch farthest from Harry. “Granger’s making a point. Bluntly.”

“Right.”

“I was rather hoping you wouldn’t fall for their trap.”

“Sorry to disappoint, Malfoy.” Harry brandished the books in the direction of the shelf. Obligingly, they floated themselves back. “Have you eaten?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Where’s the bed?”

Draco said warily, “There isn’t one.”

“Are we supposed to sleep on the couches?”

“Wish for a bed.”

“I already did. It’s not working.”

“Thought so. Neither of us owns this Room, and Granger’s made it so that it refuses to change.”

“What’s the incantation to conjure a bed?”

“You’ll end up with a stone block that’ll be murder on your back.”

Harry smirked. “Tried that, did you?”

Draco ignored the provocation. “We’re better off transfiguring the couches.”

“Hm.” Harry got up. “What’s behind this door?”

“The bathroom.”

“And this one?”

“A beach.”

“What?” Harry said, disbelieving.

Blue sky. Pristine white sand. A seashell, painted like a ripe peach. Waves and seasalt. It went on and on.

“What’d I tell you,” said Draco.

Harry began to take off his shoes and his outer robes.

“Potter.”

“It’s day,” Harry remarked. “Has it been day all throughout dinner?”

“I think so. Potter, there’s nothing out there.”

“There’s a whole ocean, Malfoy. And I think I see hammocks.”

He threw his clothes down beside the door and leapt onto the sand. It was pleasantly warm, and when he ran out a bit further, it became refreshingly cool. Somewhere, gulls cried, but he couldn’t see them. The waves frothed between his toes and pulled at the fine grains of sand beneath his feet. The sensation was unexpected. The beach below the cliffs at Ursa-at-Sea wasn’t like this. He laughed.

He could hear Draco coming out as well, grumbling. Turning briefly, Harry said, “I’m going for a swim,” and took off his glasses.

“What?” said Draco, full of alarm. “Potter, you don’t know how to —“

— and Harry was in the water, uncaring. He let the waves take him under, licking his lips. It was bitter behind the tang of salt. Underneath the surface, the sea was murky where he had kicked up sand, but a clear turquoise everywhere else. The light on his skin was just like the light in Slytherin: patterned, ever-shifting, tranquil, beautiful and beloved.

He accidentally snorted water up his nose. He came up, spluttering. A hand was at his collar, tugging.

“For fuck’s sake,” Draco said, letting go.

“Oh relax,” Harry said, once he’d recovered. “It’s shallow.” He pushed his wet hair away. “I want to go further out.”

“Then it wouldn’t be shallow anymore, you idiot.”

“It might be. It’s not the real ocean.”

“Do you even know how to float?”

“Theoretically?”

“Merlin and Morgana.”

Harry bobbed over another wave and beckoned. “Come show me.”

It did get deeper further out, but not that much deeper, and there didn’t seem to be much of a current. Harry managed to float on his back on his second try.

“See,” he said to Draco. “I did it. Easy.”

Draco, treading water, looked unimpressed.

“I could fall asleep like this,” Harry said.

“I’m sure you could, Potter.”

“If you fall asleep while floating, do you sink?”

“No.”

“You sound sure.”

“I fell asleep floating in a lake once as a child.”

“Really? You’ve never told me that.”

“It was before Hogwarts.”

“Well, yeah. Obviously.”

“Father kept watch over me from the shore,” Draco reminisced. “I hadn’t meant to fall asleep.”

Draco’s hair was always much darker when wet. He hadn’t cut it; it was longer than ever. His inner robes, semi-translucent, stuck to his skin. Harry said, “Did you see the hammocks? Over there.”

“Hammocks,” Draco said, in the same way he might have said ‘spike-filled pit.’

“Beds, Malfoy.”

“I thought you’d made the ocean your bed?”

“For another ten minutes.”

It was a bit longer than that, but eventually a badly positioned swell washed over Harry’s face, and he got more water up his nose, at which point he decided ten minutes had indeed passed.

Hammocks, in Harry’s mind, were comprised of bits of string and knots, possibly uncomfortable but novel and adventurous. The hammocks they found, however, were great big luxurious swathes of cloth, suspended from one tree to its neighbour on silken lines barely perceptible to the eye and blatantly magical.

“Hermione requested this Room?” he asked as he tested one, putting all his weight into his arm.

“I doubt it was Parkinson. That bookshelf, for one.”

“No but, I mean.” Harry climbed on. The hammock swayed. “Remember when you said you wanted to go somewhere with sunshine and palm trees? Here we are.”

Draco tensed. “I’m going to sleep on the couch.”

“Draco.”

But Draco was already walking away. 

***

They had breakfast together the next morning. Harry demanded that they have it on the beach. Draco complained that the sand got into his eggs and ate them anyway.

“Let’s go for a walk,” Harry said, as soon as they were done.

“Where to?”

“Anywhere. As far as we can go. What else is there to do?”

Harry collected seashells as they went. Soon enough, he had so many they wouldn’t all fit in his pockets, and he had to transfigure a makeshift bag from his outer robes.

“I don’t think you can keep those, Potter,” warned Draco. “They belong to the Room.”

Harry held a conch shell to his ear, then held it to Draco’s. “Do you hear music?”

“They amplify the surrounding sound,” said Draco patiently. “It’s not actually the sound of the ocean — oh. What tune is that?”

They tested every conch shell they could find. Each one had a different set of notes. Harry’s favourite was a blue-white shell that had a merry, fluted folk melody.

Lunch materialised at some point on a picnic blanket. Sandwiches and pumpkin juice. It gave Harry an idea.

“House-elves,” he said. “If you want to get out. We can call the house-elves. They could help.”

Draco was staring at the horizon. He’d shown no sign of surprise at Harry’s suggestion. He said, “They could.” And, “We should start walking back.”

Harry dropped the seashells as they went, one by one. Draco walked slightly ahead of him and made no conversation. They got back in time for dinner to appear in front of the fireplace, and neither of them made any move to summon house-elves.

“Are you still sleeping on the couch?” Harry asked, when it was bedtime.

“Yes.”

“There are two hammocks.”

“It’s broad daylight out there.”

“It’s relaxing, in the shade.”

“Good for you.”

Harry held back the sigh. “All right, fine. Night.”

“Good night.”

***

The constant daylight was disorientating, but it kept the worst of his nightmares at bay. Still, whenever he woke up, which was frequently, he had trouble getting back asleep. Finally, at around five in the morning, he gave up and decided to go for another swim.

He’d progressed from attempting to hold his breath for as long as he could to an awkward dog paddle that allowed him to travel at the speed of one inch per hour when he noticed Draco standing at the edge of the water, watching him.

“Hey,” he said, heaving himself out onto the packed wet sand and flopping down onto his back higher up the beach.

“Hi,” Draco said, following him.

“Where are my glasses? _Accio glasses_.” He caught them and rested them on his chest, then said to Draco, “Can you sit down? No, move up a little. Okay. Right there. Good.”

“Potter, I’m not blocking the sun for you. Conjure a parasol or something.”

“Yeah yeah, Malfoy. Listen, just stay there for a while, will you? I want to sleep a bit more.” Harry closed his eyes.

Draco was still there when he opened them again, sitting in the exact same spot, leaning back on his hands, staring at Harry.

“It hasn’t been very long,” Draco said in a strange tone. “About an hour. Did that count as sleeping?”

“Dozing, maybe,” Harry acknowledged.

Very carefully, Draco traced with his finger the place where the shadows under Harry’s eyes might have been, if Harry had had any. “Charms?” he asked.

“Potions,” Harry told him.

“Oh.”

“You?”

“Charms.”

Harry hesitated. “How are you, really?”

“Exhausted,” Draco admitted, and added, “This is what Parkinson and Granger were after, locking us up in here.”

Harry raised his eyebrows.

“They think we’ve had a fight,” Draco went on. “They want us to make up.”

“I told Hermione it wasn’t a fight.”

“Pansy’s had her minions stalking me for weeks; she thinks it’s a fight.”

“Well it’s not.”

“Yes, Potter, I do know.”

Harry turned onto his side, further into Draco’s shadow. His glasses fell from his chest and into the sand. Draco picked them up. Harry said, “I spoke with your mother.”

Draco froze. “What did you speak about?”

“You, genius.”

“Well,” Draco said, unfreezing and blowing specks of sand off Harry’s glasses. “Well, I — I spoke with Aunt Andromeda.”

“Mm. And?”

“Tonks wants to marry Lupin. They’re going to have a child together. Did you know that?”

“I heard. Just the other week.”

Draco offered Harry his glasses. Harry shook his head. Draco put them in a pocket. He said, “The Ministry’s almost done combing through the Manor. They sent me a notice.” A faint sneer. “I’m sure they took every opportunity to strip it down.”

He was jumping from topic to topic. Harry said, “Are you going to go inspect it? Should I come with you?”

“I was … I was going to ask. Will you?”

“Tell me when.”

Draco nodded. He said, “They found Father’s wand.”

“Oh.”

“It’s broken.” Draco took a palmful of sand and let it blow away in the wind. He did it again and again. “I — I’m — it’s always the same thing with me. Aren’t you tired of it?”

“The same thing?” Harry echoed quietly.

“The same thing. Father, he — he did everything he could for me, didn’t he? He cared for me, he educated me, and he gave me something to be proud of, and all I needed to do was to not — to not disappoint him so badly. Except I did, and I — I’m _still_ —“ he bit off the sentence. He said, “The Manor’s a wreck.”

“That’s not your fault.”

“Do you know what Aunt Andromeda said to me? She said to me, ‘Draco, it doesn’t matter.’ She said, ‘Draco, it truly doesn’t.’”

“She’s had longer than you to come to that conclusion.”

“She broke up her family!”

“She made a new one.”

“She betrayed them. She —“

“You really think she betrayed them? Or is it just what you think _you’d_ do, if you —“

“She’s a traitor,” Draco said. “And I would be, too. If I.”

The sunlight had given Draco a golden halo. That was all Harry could see clearly, without his glasses. He said, “When I was very very young, I used to think that I could make the Dursleys love me. By doing what I was told, or by working out what they approved of and making sure it happened. Cleaning the house more, getting up earlier to make them all breakfast, being as quiet and unobtrusive and agreeable as possible. None of it worked. They either didn’t notice, or did notice and demanded more. Better obedience, greater convenience. If I hadn’t realised that it wasn’t working, if I had — they would have suffocated every part of me. Even so, some version of me never made it out of that cupboard. Draco, I know that it’s not the same — it’s not the same at all — but sometimes a family betrays you first. Sometimes no matter what you do, you can’t — you just can’t make it work. And then the only thing you _can_ do is get out. I don’t think Andromeda is a traitor. Or if she is, then all of them betrayed each other.”

“Father didn’t betray me,” Draco whispered.

“Didn’t he?” Harry said, very gently. “He tried to kill me.”

“He wasn’t in his right mind at the time.”

“You’re making excuses.”

Draco didn’t deny it. He said, “It’s not like it must be. It’s not like — like Archer, and Gaea, is it? You could live without me. I — I should be able to live without you.”

Harry thought of Theo saying: feelings fade. He couldn’t see how, but it was true, wasn’t it? It had to be, even if it seemed impossible. So he said: “Yes.”

“We’ll see each other at — I don’t know, Ministry functions. Dinners. And we’ll laugh about it.”

“How depressing,” Harry said. “I don’t want to laugh about it.” He paused, considering. “You know, when I was dead, I thought of you.”

“What?”

“It was kind of like a dream. I was looking for you; I found you on the train. You asked me about my hat.”

“Hat?”

“I had a hat. Mum gave it to me, when I was thinking over whether or not to remain dead.” He squinted. The ocean was a kaleidoscope of white and blue, bright sky on bright water. “Archer and Gaea, you said. Have you reread it again?”

“I haven’t. Potter. What?”

“The point is,” persisted Harry, “I got to come back. I got another chance. And I refuse to just — I refuse to waste it by, I don’t know, seeing you at _Ministry functions_ of all things and laughing over champagne or whatever ridiculous scenario you’re imagining. I absolutely refuse. What was it you said to me once? That if I broke off with you, you were going to resent me until the end of your days? Well, Draco: if _you_ break off with me, I’ve decided that I’m going to find another way to be happy. I swear I will.”

“Potter —“

“I decided just then. But I mean it.”

“Was that a threat?”

“What? How could it be a threat?”

“You know, like a, ‘I’ll be happy without you, so there,’ kind of thing?”

“No, you pillock. It’s — I just mean, in this stupid hypothetical future that you’ve made up, I refuse to keep, to pine after you or whatever —“

“You’re pining after me?”

“Shut up,” Harry said. “What I’m trying to say is that — Draco, this is final. It will be final. Do you understand? It will be final because we could do this, this future where we go in separate directions. Betrayals and families and mothers and fathers and wrecks of houses, whatever, decide how you will, but it will be final. It’s not like Archer’s story, which you can read over and over to try and get a better ending. Okay? You have to be honest, like you said you were going to be. I won’t let you take it back.”

He couldn’t quite make out the expression on Draco’s face, and then Draco turned away. Draco said, barely audible, “I don’t doubt that you can live very well without me.”

Harry sat up. He touched Draco’s shoulder blade, where the scapula underneath his thin robes was sharp and defensive. He said, “Draco.”

Draco went on, addressing the ocean, “I wish you couldn’t. I wish you’d say you couldn’t.”

“No you don’t,” Harry contradicted.

“Yes I do.”

“Why?”

“When you were — dead — I thought that, if — I thought that I couldn’t.” Draco swallowed. His voice broke, all of a sudden. “Keep living, that is.”

Pressing his hand down firmer, Harry said, “You would have, though.”

“Potter. You don’t know.”

“I really do,” Harry insisted.

“You don’t. You — you died, Potter. I may have been right in the end about your, your revival — but you died. You were dead. Everyone said so. And I — I’d never — I really thought that I couldn’t. I knew that I should be able to, but I — even when I was fighting everyone, when I broke Pomfrey’s arm, I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t sure that I wasn’t just — just losing it completely. And the longer it went on, the more I thought that — Potter, try to understand. Try, for me. I thought that if I wasn’t sure, I should just —“ He stopped.

“Draco —“

Draco shoved at the sand in front of him. “Back in Sweden, you never really said.”

“What?”

“About — after. What would happen after.”

Harry thought back. “You mean after the war? After Hogwarts?”

Draco shrugged.

“I did ask you, that night in the hospital wing. Remember? You said you didn’t want to talk about it.”

Obstinately, Draco said, “You only repeat what I say. You’ve never said yourself.”

“You know what I want to happen,” Harry said.

“Do I?”

“Of course you —“ Harry frowned. “Of course you do. What do you want me to say? Draco, I can’t make you do anything. I can’t — if you decide that you have to, I don’t know, to fulfill your duty to your ancestors — if you decide that, then I can’t force you to change your mind. It has to be —“

“I know that, Potter —“

“— your choice.”

“I _know_, Potter,” Draco said loudly. “I just, I want to hear you say it. Will you?”

Harry stared at him. “You want me to say it? Say what? Ask me properly.”

Draco made a face. But then: “Tell me about the future. The one that doesn’t need to happen.”

Harry took his glasses from Draco’s pocket. “Okay.” He put them on, thinking carefully. “Okay. Draco, I’ll live the rest of my life with you if you’d let me.” The words came slowly, but he could feel the yearning pull of them even as the syllables formed. “Grimmauld Place, Ursa-at-Sea, Malfoy Manor, a shack in the middle of nowhere. I don’t care where. I’ll sleep where you sleep. I’ll sit with you by the fire on cold winter nights. I’ll listen to you play the violin or the viola or the harp, even if you do it badly. I’ll put your books away when you’re done reading them. And you’ll do your alchemy experiments and tell me about them over dinner. We’ll go long-distance flying together. I’ll — god, I don’t know, I’ll brush your hair in the mornings; I’ll tangle it back up at night.” His mouth was dry. “I hadn’t really thought about the specifics.”

“The specifics,” Draco echoed, a little faintly.

“In the future that doesn’t need to happen,” Harry said, trying again, “I’ll be with you. We’ll be together. Is that enough of an answer? Did I repeat too much of what you said?”

“I’ve certainly never said anything about my hair,” Draco said, still faintly.

“I like your hair.”

“Do you,” Draco muttered, and swiped self-consciously at a stray strand by his ear. Then, abruptly, he stood up. Harry raised his arm instinctively to shield his face from the sand that scattered in the breeze.

Draco said shortly, “I’m calling a house-elf. I need to get out of here.” And he marched away, leaving Harry on the shore.

***

“You told him you didn’t need to be with him to live a happy life?” Hermione asked the following Monday. “Oh, Harry.”

“Don’t give me that,” Harry told her. “I still can’t believe you conspired with Pansy to lock us up in the Room of Requirement.”

“Well I can’t believe you said that.”

“I didn’t say it that way.”

“Oh, _Harry_,” Hermione said in that voice again.

She looked exceedingly upset, which made Harry feel bad, so he said, rather sharply, “Draco knows what I meant by it. It doesn’t matter if you don’t. Leave it, Hermione.”

***

Throughout the week, Draco behaved as though nothing had changed, and their lessons had them busy enough that he got away with it. He did, however, inform Harry that the Manor inspection was scheduled for that following Sunday. Uncharacteristically, he mentioned it twice; the first time offhandedly, as if it had just occurred to him, and the second time more intently, staring at Harry until Harry looked up from his Transfiguration textbook.

“We’ll apparate from Hogsmeade,” Draco said. Inside the statement Harry heard the question.

He replied, “We’ll walk down together,” and saw Draco relax.

Sunday dawned. They held hands to apparate, and went straight to the front gate of the Manor. Narcissa was already there, waiting.

Behind her was the Manor, derelict and shrunken. The sight of it had the impact of a physical wound on the body; Narcissa and Draco, walking toward it, held themselves as though the hurt was upon their own flesh. Harry could not help but feel it too: he’d lived here, albeit in short stretches, and most of the memories he had of the place were good.

They went from room to room, inspecting the damage silently. There were signs that the Ministry workers had made an attempt at clean-up, but some stains looked as though they had bled permanently into the house. Here the wall was crooked and miscoloured; here the floor was cracked and rotting. Here was where Sirius’ body had lain. The air everywhere smelled stale. The scar in the main staircase from Lucius’ death was still there, and the pattern of its carving kept repeating itself in unexpected places. The warping that had been there during their infiltration mission was even more exaggerated, and all the portraits, when they found them clustered together, were empty. It did not look like a place anyone could live without having nightmares.

Draco was the one who found the fish.

They’d come back down to the drawing room, where the table which had held Pettigrew’s dead body in Theo’s form was overturned and broken. It appeared to have been broken on purpose. Someone had been angry.

Draco had been walking around it in a circle, expression closed, when he’d stopped with a jerk and lifted his foot, as though he’d trodden on something.

“Potter,” he said, and Harry was by his side at once.

The fish, silver-blue on the stone floor, almost invisible, swam around their feet.

“Hello,” Harry said to it, kneeling down. He looked up at Draco. “I didn’t tell you about this, did I?”

“No,” murmured Draco.

“This is how I found you, when you were stuck in the study,” Harry explained. “I had no idea where to go, but the house showed me.”

Draco knelt as well, and touched the floor. The stone flushed a richer hue under his fingers. “Oh,” he murmured, unsteady, like he was about to cry. “You’re here. We can still fix you.”

He didn’t cry. He got up and hugged Narcissa. “We can fix it, Mother.”

Harry got up as well, quietly, and left them alone.

***

He was sitting on the roof of the stables, staring out at the overgrown fields, when Draco came to find him.

“Wait,” he called, as Harry made a move to drop down. “Stay.”

With a soft _pop_, he apparated up and sat down next to Harry, legs dangling over the tiles.

“Huh,” Harry said. “I climbed up.”

“The wards are a complete mess. The Ministry had to remove a bunch; it took them weeks. The core warding is still intact, but all the extras — they’re gone.”

“Might be a good idea to reapply an Anti-Apparition Jinx, though, no?”

“Later,” Draco said.

“D’you know what I saw, just before you showed up?” Harry asked.

“What?”

Harry pointed. “A swarm of — what are they called? Those pixies or whatever. They were in Fawley’s vineyard.”

“Not pixies,” corrected Draco. “French Feira Fairies. Are you sure? Father got rid of them all.”

“I don’t know; maybe it was something else. They looked just like the ones at Fawley’s, though.”

Draco squinted. “Well, I can’t see anything over there now.”

Harry shrugged, leant back on his hands. Clear blue sky. It was pleasantly warm, and he could hear birds. He shut his eyes, bringing to mind afternoons long past, summer holidays that wouldn’t come again.

“When are you going to take your NEWTs?” Draco asked.

Harry hummed consideringly. “When are you?”

“December, obviously.”

“All right. I’ll take them then, too.”

He could practically hear Draco thinking.

Draco said, so softly Harry would have missed it if he hadn’t been tuned to Draco’s voice, “I’m going, later, to visit the mausoleum. To see Father and return to him his wand.”

“Will you take back your old wand?”

The question seemed to give Draco difficulty; his arms which had been balanced against the roof tiles shifted to cross over his bent knees. After a long moment, he uncrossed them again deliberately. “No. It belongs down there with him, I think.”

“Shall I go with you? To wait by the ouroboros?”

“I need to do this alone.”

“All right.”

Neither of them said anything for several minutes.

Eventually, Draco broke the silence. “If,” he said, “I also said that you needn’t go anywhere with me anymore, would you also give such an easy answer?”

Harry remembered that first summer, when Draco had taught him how to climb the tree that was even now green and vibrant and untouched, raining upon them dappled light. He said, “Yes,” and realised as he said it, in that precise moment, that he was lying.

In his head floated the abstract notion of what he had stated earlier, which was that he would find a way to be happy no matter what. And he could, couldn’t he? It was the decision to do something that made it more likely to happen. There was no inevitability that could be relied upon to open the future. Not even prophecies, which were fallible, unreliable. He’d fulfilled one, but in the face of the hundreds of thousands of dust-covered baubles that had sat abandoned in the Hall of Prophecy, never claimed, never quickening, what did a true prophecy mean except that someone had taken a guess and gotten lucky? It was still Harry who had had to make the decision to die, the decision to sacrifice. There was no true script to life, only choices, only consequences, over and over again in a continuous loop until it all ended. He knew that that was true. And so he knew that it should have been possible for him to say ‘Yes,’ to say ‘I understand,’ to say ‘I can let you go,’ and still find a way to smile after.

But in that precise moment he also knew that he did not want to, because the idea of this nebulous, happy future without Draco filled him with enough dread that it was making him sick, and so even as his mouth lied his hand reached toward Draco’s hand and held on.

Draco stared down at their hands. He said, the words tripping in the middle, “The other reason I’m going to see Father is to apologise.”

Harry held on tighter. How could this fade? It wouldn’t; he wouldn’t let it.

“Harry,” Draco continued. “We’re absolutely not going to live in a shack in the middle of nowhere.”

The meaning took time to process. Draco’s hand was an anchor; Draco’s words were the sea.

“I — okay,” Harry said, and didn’t feel immediately relieved, only more sick with the knowledge of what Draco was giving up, what Draco was trusting to him. “I’ll — anywhere — I’ll live anywhere you want to. As long as you want to.”

“I want to.”

“Draco,” Harry said, still unsteady, wishing now for solid ground instead of the slope of the roof, “I won’t let you take it back.”

“I know,” Draco said softly. “I won’t.” And then, in a completely different tone, “Oh, you were right.”

Harry followed the line of Draco’s finger. In the distance, across the field where the Abraxans and Granians had used to graze and was now wild with unchecked greenery, were a cloud of pink and purple pixie-shaped things.

“Father didn’t get rid of them completely after all,” Draco was saying in wonder, laughter in his breath, a light in his eyes, and Harry, moving as forests do toward the sun, ever upward, kissed him.


	37. Epilogue

“I’m having second thoughts about the speech,” Harry admitted, as he adjusted his robe belt in front of the mirror, which tutted at him.

“Don’t think of it like a speech,” Draco said from the bed, where, still only half-dressed, he was floating several breakfast items in the air but not eating them, because he was too preoccupied with the letter he was reading. The letter had crease lines where it had been folded into thirds, and was clearly Muggle paper stock, not wizarding parchment. “All you’re doing is introducing Granger. Just say some nice things about her, grin at the press, and get off the stage.”

Harry sighed. “Are you coming, by the way?”

“Of course I am.”

“Only it’s in thirty minutes.”

“Is it? Excellent, I have time to write a reply. What’s your opinion on aero-planes? Have you ever been on one?”

“Nope.”

“Is it true there are tens of thousands of them in the sky every single day?”

“Er … I have no idea, sorry.”

“Do Muggles not find it terribly disruptive? Really, I should submit a proposal to the Ministry; it’s preposterous that our legislation around flying objects is so restrictive when Muggles have unleashed fifty million giant metal tubes into the air. Couldn’t we just charm flying carpets to look like these things from below? Hang on, maybe I should draft a proposal right now so I can get Granger’s opinion after the ceremony.”

“Oh my god,” Harry said, and went to firecall Ron. Ron would understand.

Ron did understand, and together they commiserated over Harry’s plight right up until the last second when Ron clapped him sympathetically but unhelpfully on the arm and gave him a thumbs up, and Harry had to get up on the enchanted, translucent platform where he stumbled over his words and coughed into his _Sonorus_ before at last Hermione took over, beaming and brilliant, to officially announce the success of her campaign and the eradication of Dementors from Azkaban henceforth.

Cameras flashed. Quills raced. Harry went back to the front row, high-fived Ron, and sat down, leaning ever so slightly into Draco’s shoulder. Pansy, on Draco’s other side, whispered something into Draco’s ear. Draco whispered back, and as he did so his hand snaked around the edge of the chair to touch, casual and yet proprietary, calming and dear, the one inch line of Harry’s skin exposed above his collar.

It had only been fifteen months since Harry had found his way back to the living, but Hermione had already managed this. Theo’s father was going to serve out his life sentence. Choices and consequences, on and on. Ron was looking at jobs overseas, and he and Hermione were discussing the merits of long-distance relationships, insofar as distance mattered to wizards and witches. Pansy’s branch of Hogwarts One Hundred was running a support network for wizarding orphans from the war. Draco’s alchemist friend in Egypt, whom he’d met at one of Slughorn’s parties, had agreed to mentor him, and he was saying that he fancied a trip over there soon. Perhaps, he’d suggested, they could fly there on brooms, taking their time along the way.

And Harry, though hounded by the media who asked him the question at least once a week, still did not know what he wanted to do. But he wasn’t in any kind of rush. It was enough, for now, to simply be.

Hermione had planned a special symbolic gesture to round off the ceremony. At her signal, they all stood up, the whole front row, there upon the North Sea in view of that formidable towering block of black stone, and raised their wands.

All of them, including Draco. He smiled at Harry as he did so, and the force of the spell was already there between the two of them before it was cast.

Together, they said, “_Expecto Patronum._“


End file.
